Impact of two stage evaporative cooling system using underground water powered by PV panels on improving the thermal comfort of emergency relief tents in dry-hot climate regions

Abstract

People are often forced to leave their homes owing to several reasons, such as natural disasters and conflicts, and in these cases, speed and cost are critical factors in saving millions of souls. Therefore, relief tents are the best solution in these situations. However, the internal environment of these kinds of tents might be uncomfortable, especially on hot or extremely cold days. Evaporative cooling systems are one of the simple and inexpensive techniques used to improve thermal comfort in a variety of applications, including agricultural, industrial, and residential. For this reason, the present work aims to investigate experimentally the impact of utilizing a two-stage indirect/direct evaporative cooling system using underground water driven by photovoltaic panels on improving the thermal comfort conditions within the relief tent. The experiments were conducted during the summer season of 2022 under different parameters, including the cellulosic pad thickness and the water volume flow rates in direct and indirect cooling stages. The results showed that the used evaporative cooling system improved the thermal comfort conditions inside the tent model, with an indoor daily average temperature reduction of about 12.4–14.8 °C in comparison to the standard tent model. Furthermore, the study outcomes revealed that, due to the remarkable impact of the extra heat exchanger in the indirect cooling stage, the proposed cooling system may offer airflow conditions inside the thermal comfort zone even without utilizing the direct cooling stage.