Abstract
The presence of building balconies can significantly modify the near-façade wind flow pattern and surface pressures. The present study evaluates the impact of building balcony geometry on mean wind speed on balcony spaces and wind-induced mean surface pressure for generic high-rise buildings. The focus is on balconies that extend along the entire width of the building façade. Large-eddy simulations (LES), validated with wind tunnel experiments, are conducted to investigate the impact of (i) balconies present or not, (ii) balcony depth, (iii) balcony parapet walls, (iv) balcony partition walls, and (v) density of balconies. The results indicate that the balcony geometry can greatly affect the mean wind speed on balcony spaces and the local and façade-averaged mean pressure coefficient (Cp). The presence of balconies can increase the façade-averaged Cp over the windward and leeward façades by 5.2% and 8.9%, respectively. These numbers rise to 23.5% and 23.3% when two partition walls are added at the lateral edges of the façades. Adding five partition walls can reduce the overall area-averaged wind speed on balcony spaces by 68.0% compared to the case without partition walls. These findings can be useful in developing, designing and constructing buildings with façade geometrical details that improve building ventilation, air quality and wind comfort.
Highlights
The presence of large-scale roughness on building façades can significantly influence the near-façade wind flow and surface pressure distributions [1,2]
An earlier study on a building with balconies found that steady Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) can accurately predict the mean pressure coefficient (Cp) on the wind ward façade of a building for both perpendicular (θ = 0◦) and oblique (θ = 45◦) wind directions, while it systematically underestimates the absolute value of Cp on the leeward façade for these two wind di rections (θ = 0◦ and θ = 45◦) [1]
P − P0 0.5ρUr2ef where P is the mean pressure on the building surface, P0 is the reference static pressure, ρ is the air density (1.225 kg/m3), and Uref is the mean wind speed at the gradient height in the wind tunnel (Hg = 0.625 m)
Summary
The presence of large-scale roughness on building façades can significantly influence the near-façade wind flow and surface pressure distributions [1,2]. An earlier study on a building with balconies found that steady RANS can accurately predict the mean pressure coefficient (Cp) on the wind ward façade of a building for both perpendicular (θ = 0◦) and oblique (θ = 45◦) wind directions, while it systematically underestimates the absolute value of Cp on the leeward façade for these two wind di rections (θ = 0◦ and θ = 45◦) [1] This is mainly because of the de ficiencies of steady RANS in capturing the complexities of the near-façade wind flow, which include multiple areas of flow separation, recirculation and reattachment generated by the bal conies [21,22,23]. This paper investigates the impact of the geometrical characteristic of building balconies on the near-façade mean wind flow patterns and mean surface pressures. Limitations and future work (Section 5) and conclusions (Section 6) are provided
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