Simulation Study on the Effect of Courtyards Design on Natural Ventilation: The Case Study of a Beauty Centre in Germany

Abstract

This paper examines how to enhance the indoor environmental quality and thermal comfort in a beauty centre in Germany, by implementing courtyard in the building as a natural ventilation method. The courtyard ventilation method will be discussed in the literature review and will apply it using IES VE computer software with different strategies in different scenarios to achieve the optimum natural ventilation with the best scenario. This will include designing the base case scenario, and next, the HVAC system will be switched off during the summer and apply 3 different strategies with 3 scenarios each to study the effect of natural ventilation of courtyards in terms of energy consumption and thermal comfort and choose the best-case scenario. The winning case scenario is “scenario 8” as it has dropped 2.3 MWh from the total energy based on the base case scenario. Natural ventilation is important as it helps in improving the thermal comfort of the indoor and outdoor environment and controlling the inside temperature along with the air quality and movement. Moreover, it helps in reducing the usage of energy and thus reducing costs. All the strategies, scenarios and simulations were done by the authors using IES VE software.