Computational Fluid Dynamics Tools Research Articles

A hybrid method for modelling wake flow of a wind turbine

A fast and accurate prediction of the wake of an upwind turbine is very important to quantify the performance of downwind turbines in offshore wind farms, which become larger and larger. The wake flow and dynamics may be quite accurately simulated by high-fidelity computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software but its computational costs are too high, in particular to simulate a long wake flow often required in engineering practice. Therefore, the wake is often modelled by simplified dynamic wake models in design practices. They are computationally efficient but could not catch all physics, depend on pre-specified empirical parameters, and are not suitable for flow near the turbine. This paper proposes a new hybrid method, in which the near wake flow is simulated by a CFD model based on Navier–Stokes equations with the turbine represented by actuator lines while the far wake flow is modelled by an improved simplified CFD-based dynamic wake model. The two models are two-way coupled at a section downwind the turbine. The newly formulated method is validated by the results of full CFD simulations in the whole domain. Its performances are investigated under different conditions. It will be demonstrated that the new method takes considerably less computational time than the full CFD tool to produce similar results.

CFD SIMULATION OF SAND CONTENT INFLUENCE IN OIL PRODUCTION PIPELINES

The presence of sand close to hydrocarbons in production is most often harmful to well productivity. This also leads to undesired problems in surface devices and equipment, as well as obstructions in the production column and, consequently, decreasing fluid flow production and causing severe economic losses to the field. The objective of this work is to study the influence of sand content in production pipelines through simulation using computational fluid dynamics tools ICEM CFD and ANSYS CFX 19.0- student version in vertical, directional and horizontal well scenarios, with variations of parameters such as the saturation of the fluids present in the system and the type of oil being produced. The results obtained indicate some impacts of excessive sand production in oil wells, such as a decrease in productivity in more than 20% for the case with 10% sand content in the pipeline, and a decrease in productivity in more than 39% for the case with 20% sand content in the pipe. In addition, the increase in head loss for lifting fluids was observed.

Numerical study on the load-range extension of gasoline-fueled homogeneous charge compression ignition combustion in a light-duty diesel engine

Recent research on homogeneous charge compression ignition (HCCI) engines has demonstrated that these engines can complement traditional compression-ignition engines. The higher octane number and vapor pressure make gasoline-like fuels more suitable for port fuel-injected HCCI engines. Doping gasoline with ignition promoters eliminates intake charge preheating or turbocharging requirements and reduces cyclic variations in combustion, especially at lower engine loads. Seeding the intake charge with suitable diluents enables higher load extension of doped gasoline-fueled HCCI engines by preventing knocking. In the present study, HCCI experiments in a 0.662-litre, light-duty diesel engine using 2-Ethylhexyl nitrate (EHN)/gasoline blends formed a database for validating computational fluid dynamic (CFD) simulations. The CFD tool could capture the qualitative trends of HCCI combustion, performance, and emission parameters. The validated CFD tool was then used to investigate a suitable ignition promoter other than EHN to blend with gasoline such that a constant combustion phasing was achieved. Di-tert butyl peroxide (DTBP), hydrogen peroxide, nitric oxide, nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and ozone were the investigated ignition promoters. Further, the effects of adding diluents, including exhaust gas recirculation, nitrogen, carbon dioxide (CO2), and water vapor (H2O) on EHN-gasoline HCCI combustion, were studied for a constant combustion phasing retardation of 5 °CA towards aTDC. The primary objective of the present study was to select the most suitable ignition promoter and diluent for gasoline-fueled HCCI combustion. The results show that the least quantity of EHN and CO2 was required to control HCCI combustion phasing among the tested ignition promoters and diluents. Using NO2 as an ignition promoter and H2O vapor as a diluent improved the gross indicated thermal efficiency by 24% and 17%, respectively, compared to DTBP and EGR, which produced the lowest gross indicated thermal efficiency.

Improvement of ALFRED thermal hydraulics through experiments and numerical studies

Research and development on Generation IV concepts cooled by heavy liquid metals have been supported through several national and international funds. Looking at the European community, the technology benefited from approximately 145 M€ of investments, increasing the technology readiness level through various areas including safety and resilience, neutronics and thermal hydraulics. One of the projects currently pursued in Europe and supported by numerous research centers, private companies and member states is ALFRED (Advanced Lead Cooled Fast Reactor European Demonstrator), born around 10 years ago within the LEADER project. Following the FP7 project, Romania declared its support in ALFRED development by proposing as hosting country and the FALCON consortium (Fostering ALFRED Construction) was set out, consisting of Ansaldo Nucleare, ENEA and RATEN-ICN. The consortium has recently revised the reactor concept to solve some thermal hydraulic issues with an increase of technology know-how. The changes were supported by a new deployment strategy based on different power stages, appointing ALFRED as the demonstrator for the future fleet of commercial SMRs cooled by liquid lead. Several experimental campaigns and numerical analyses developed by the consortium and its supporting organizations have been of extreme importance. The areas that benefited mostly from this effort were the thermal hydraulics of the reactor pool, of the core and of the safety systems, thanks to numerical studies made with system codes, computational fluid dynamic tools supported by ENEA technological infrastructure. The paper presents the new plant concept, reporting some of the most important results that have made it possible to solve complex problems such as thermal striping, thermal stratification and freezing of lead by overcooling. Lastly, the paper highlights the next steps for ALFRED development, such as the construction of various experimental facilities that will develop the test campaigns for the safety justification and licensing of the plant.

Fire Spread in Multi-Storey Timber Building, a CFD Study

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the fire performance in a multi-storey cross-laminated timber (CLT) structure by the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) technique using the Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS v.6.7). The study investigates fire temperature, heat release rate (HRR), and gas concentration (O2, CO2). The importance of this research is to ensure that the fire performance of timber buildings is adequate for occupant safety and property protection. Moreover, the proposed technique provides safety measures in advance for engineers when designing buildings with sufficient fire protection by predicting the fire temperature, time to flashover and fire behaviour. The present numerical modelling is designed to represent a 10-storey CLT residential building where each floor has an apartment with 9.14 m length by 9.14 width dimensions. The pyrolysis model was performed with thermal and kinetic parameters where the furniture, wood cribs and CLT were allowed to burn by themselves in simulation. This research is based on a full-scale experiment of a two-storey CLT building. The present results were validated by comparing them with the experimental data. Numerical simulation of CLT building models show a very close accuracy to the experiment performed in the benchmark paper. The results show that the CFD tools such as FDS can be used for predicting fire scenarios in multi-storey CLT buildings.

Heat Transfer Coefficient Distribution—A Review of Calculation Methods

Determination of the heat transfer coefficient (HTC) distribution is important during the design and operation of many devices in microelectronics, construction, the car industry, drilling, the power industry and research on nuclear fusion. The first part of the manuscript shows works describing how a change in the coefficient affects the operation of devices. Next, various methods of determining the coefficient are presented. The most common method to determine the HTC is the use of Newton’s law of cooling. If this method cannot be applied directly, there are other methods that can be found in the open literature. They use analytical formulations, the lumped thermal capacity assumption, the 1D unsteady heat conduction equation for a semi-infinite wall, the fin model, energy conservation and the analogy between heat and mass transfer. The HTC distribution can also be calculated by means of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modelling if all boundary conditions with fluid and solid properties are known. Often, the surface on which the HTC is to be determined is not accessible for any measuring sensors, or their installation might disturb the analysed phenomenon. It also happens that calculations using direct or CFD methods cannot be performed due to the lack of required boundary conditions or sufficiently proven models to analyse the considered physical phenomena. Too long a calculation time needed by CFD tools may also be problematic if the method should be used in the online mode. One way to solve the above problem is to assume an unknown boundary condition and include additional information from the sensors located at a certain distance from the investigated surface. The problem defined in this way can be solved by inverse methods. The aim of the paper is to show the current state of knowledge regarding the importance of the heat transfer coefficient and the variety of methods that can be used for its determination.

Advances in anode configurations for a microbial fuel cell via a computational fluid dynamics electrochemistry and its experimental validation

AbstractBACKGROUNDThe experimental process for optimizing microbial fuel cell (MFC) design under different electrode geometries is restricted. An MFC can be defined as a bio‐electrochemical system (BES) that facilitates the direct conversion of the chemical energy stored in organic matter into electrical energy by harnessing the metabolic activity of microorganisms. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) tools allow the simulation and evaluation of electro‐analysis phenomena such as cyclic voltammetry and chemical reactions, which can help the optimization of the BESs. In this study, MFC is designed to provide the maximum peak current and efficiency for the applied voltage on various working (or anode) electrode geometries (i.e. hexagonal, square, pentagonal, circular, triangular, rectangular, and rhombus).RESULTSThe CFD simulation results demonstrate that a configuration with a larger perimeter value and surface area (i.e. hexagonal design) of the working electrode shows a higher peak current (2422.75 mA) than other configurations. The experimental findings supported the simulation result and reveal that a hexagonal electrode containing a MFC setup produces a maximum power density of 22.41 ± 0.32 mW m−3 and a current density of 41.58 ± 0.35 mA m−2. The MFC operation demonstrated adequate bioelectricity generation of 540 ± 03 mV on Day 4 of operation at 1000 Ω. Additionally, maximum reduction in chemical oxygen demand (76.13 ± 0.5%) and coulombic efficiency (76.03 ± 0.4%) was achieved for synthetic wastewater using a hexagonal MFC.CONCLUSIONBased on these fundamental discoveries, the CFD simulation and its experimental validation considerably drag focus toward the possibility of employing COMSOL Multiphysics software for system improvement of different MFC system applications. © 2023 Society of Chemical Industry (SCI).

Performance Prediction, Optimisation and Validation of a CNG Engine Intake Manifold of a Commercial Vehicle Using Transient CFD Analysis

Developing countries like India have large consumer markets driven by huge demands. Commercial vehicles play a critical role in full filing these demands. Commercial vehicles increasingly face stringent emission norms criteria and hence designing an ICE-powertrain with optimum operating efficiency becomes paramount. Intake manifold is the critical part of an internal combustion engine that supplies fuel/ air mixture to all the cylinders combustion chambers. It ensures a uniform mixture at cylinder inlet for better mixing inside the cylinders for better volumetric efficiency. Uneven distribution of fuel/air mixture causes unstable torque and unburnt fuel which fails to meet the emission norms. It also results in uneven temperatures in each cylinder because of cylinder misfiring. In current paper, 3D Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations are carried out to investigate the variance and uniformity of CNG/air mixture at the outlet of intake manifold. Commercial CFD tool Ansys Fluent is used to study the flow distribution of mixture inside the manifold and runners. Initial estimation of flow pattern is done by performing a steady state simulation to predict the uniformity index of CNG at cylinder inlet. For detailed investigation, transient simulation is performed by taking fresh air and CNG mass flow rate as a function of crank angle. In this paper, mesh dependence study was done initially to achieve an optimum cell count with good accuracy. A detailed transient analysis using multi-species modelling for air & CNG was done using automated scripts with time steps as small as 1 degree crank angle rotation coupled with injection pressure and injection timing study. This helped to identify critical areas and optimise the design to improve the mass flow rate variance from 15-20% for baseline case to 6-7% for final design, and also improve the uniformity index. It also helped reduce the CNG engine mis-firing issue. The results have been well validated with Laboratory Test Results.
 

A multi-time scales semi-decoupled CHT (Coupled Heat Transfer) model and its application on piston transient heat transfer simulation

Transient CHT simulations between in-cylinder combustion and chamber components are difficult to achieve due to time scale issues. In this study, a multi-time scales semi-decoupled CHT model is proposed and verified by mature CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) tools (e.g., Openfoam, Star CCM+, and Fluent) in a simple structure. Then, the established model is used to simulate the transient CHT process between the in-cylinder combustion and the piston. The calculated results are compared with the experimental results of the piston hardness plug. The 1D (one Dimensional) analysis demonstrates that the amplitude of the solid temperature fluctuation reaches an equilibrium state almost at the beginning of the calculation. The comparative results show that the calculation speed of the multi-time scales semi-decoupled CHT model is increased by about 15 to 20 times. The accuracy of the calculated results of the four methods is highly consistent (the difference is less than 0.4 °C). In the coupled heat transfer simulation of the piston and in-cylinder combustion, only four in-cylinder cycles are calculated to achieve the convergence of piston temperature. The hardness plug test value on the piston's top surface is higher than the peak value of the temperature wave.

Aerodynamic performance-preserving construction method for a near-net-shape blade cross section

Aeroengine blades are typical thin-walled structural parts, which are prone to deformations when forming near-net-shape blade blanks. The qualified blade body is produced by a precision blanking process, but with a small deformation. Moreover, the leading edge and trailing edge (LE/TE) connected to the blade body have excess material to be removed. Using the design blade model, it is difficult to machine the LE/TE to a contour that smoothly transitions to the deformed body. However, a LE/TE with smooth joints to the blade body can be machined by constructing a temporary guiding model that guides the finishing process based on blank measurement data. Unfortunately, this model has a discrepancy between its LE/TE shape and design's in order to smoothly join with the deformed blade body, which causes its aerodynamic performance to deviate from the design value. To address the above issues, we have developed an innovative method for constructing aerodynamic performance-preserving cross sections for temporary guiding models. First, geometric features that have a significant impact on the aerodynamic performance are selected as constraints. Second, we define the constraint equations for the geometric features of the thickness curve and the camber line. Finally, an affine transformation is used to construct the camber lines, and a progressive iterative least square fitting algorithm is refined to construct the thickness curves. The total pressure loss coefficient of the constructed cross sections is simulated using computational fluid dynamics tools. The results show that the proposed method can effectively reduce the effect of blank forming deformations on the aerodynamic performance of machined blades.

Aerodynamic performance improvement of a blended wing-body re-entry vehicle using ANSYS CFX

The main objective of this paper is to evaluate the aerodynamic performance of a modified blended wing-bodied re-entry vehicle by computational fluid dynamics. This analysis examines the airflow properties like pressure, density, and temperature under hypersonic flow. The study of a blended wing model at different Mach speeds and angles of attack is also included in the research paper. All the simulations in this paper are performed using the computational fluid dynamics tool of ANSYS CFX. Shear stress transport (SST) turbulence computational fluid dynamics model has been used for numerical analysis. Various inlet conditions are applied to get the aerodynamic parameters. The results revealed that the best Re-entry condition is from 10 to 20 degrees angle of attack at Mach 22, and the vehicle is very stable at a high angle of attack and Mach number. The obtained results have been validated with the public domain literature. The blended wing body has been thoroughly examined in various important locations, particularly the spacecraft nose and flap sections.

Safe Design of a Hydrogen-Powered Ship: CFD Simulation on Hydrogen Leakage in the Fuel Cell Room

Adopting proton exchange membrane fuel cells fuelled by hydrogen presents a promising solution for the shipping industry’s deep decarbonisation. However, the potential safety risks associated with hydrogen leakage pose a significant challenge to the development of hydrogen-powered ships. This study examines the safe design principles and leakage risks of the hydrogen gas supply system of China’s first newbuilt hydrogen-powered ship. This study utilises the computational fluid dynamics tool FLACS to analyse the hydrogen dispersion behaviour and concentration distributions in the hydrogen fuel cell room based on the ship’s parameters. This study predicts the flammable gas cloud and time points when gas monitoring points first reach the hydrogen volume concentrations of 0.8% and 1.6% in various leakage scenarios, including four different diameters (1, 3, 5, and 10 mm) and five different directions. This study’s findings indicate that smaller hydrogen pipeline diameters contribute to increased hydrogen safety. Specifically, in the hydrogen fuel cell room, a single-point leakage in a hydrogen pipeline with an inner diameter not exceeding 3 mm eliminates the possibility of flammable gas cloud explosions. Following a 10 mm leakage diameter, the hydrogen concentration in nearly all room positions reaches 4.0% within 6 s of leakage. While the leakage diameter does not impact the location of the monitoring point that first activates the hydrogen leak alarm and triggers an emergency hydrogen supply shutdown, the presence of obstructions near hydrogen detectors and the leakage direction can affect it. These insights provide guidance on the optimal locations for hydrogen detectors in the fuel cell room and the pipeline diameters on hydrogen gas supply systems, which can facilitate the safe design of hydrogen-powered ships.

Design and Numerical Study of Serpentine Duct using Flow Controllers for Flow Characteristics Enhancement

In the current work, computational study has been carrying out on the both baseline serpentine duct to know the flow behaviour and baseline with vortex generator to know the effect of vortex generators on the flow properties of the duct. A set of vortex generators are chosen for the study, by keeping all other parameters constant. Here in current work, for modelling the duct and vortex generator CATIA V5 is used; to discretizing the geometry ICEM CFD is used. For the analysis, the computational fluid dynamics tool FLUENT is used, SST k-ù model available in the FLUENT is used for the computations, and the results of current work will be validated with experimental results and shows that they are converged. Use of vortex generator in the current work proved extremely effective in enforcing the active flow control. Results obtained in this work are to study the pressure recovery at the engine face. The results ensure that the current work on the baseline model of serpentine inlet duct and model with vortex generator comparison is well established in case of pressure recovery and decrease in engine face distortion. After comparing the result of both baseline duct and duct with vortex generator we are expecting at least 25-35% of pressure recovery at the engine face. In the present study significant improvements characterized by an improved pressure recovery and decrease in distortion are observed over the baseline model of serpentine duct for vortex generator model. This reduction in pressure loss and distortion enhances the engine performance of thrust and also improves the overall performance of the engine.

Numerical analysis of the effectiveness of a unique roughened surface solar air heater

ABSTRACT The main goal of this study is to enhance the functionality of the solar air heater by adding unique roughened surfaces to the absorber section that disrupt the sluggish sub-layer. The roughened surfaces are created so that the depth of roughened surface’s dimension is constant for all the cases; there will not be any pressure difference lost. Initially, a square roughened surface is considered for the primary plain tube solar air heater. Later, the remaining roughened surfaces are created by removing some triangular portions from the basic square rib surfaces. The primary intention of creating surfaces like this is that the sharp edges facing the upwind stream disturb the viscous sub-layer at a greater level than the squared rib roughened surfaces. Using a computational fluid dynamics tool, this research problem has been investigated numerically by computing formula that controls the fluid flow with the RNG k-ε turbulence model. The functionality of solar-powered air heaters has been examined at different Reynolds numbers by studying temperature, turbulence, and the Nusselt number. Based on the overall comparison of the numerical results for the different roughened surfaces, Case 4 offers superior heat transmission performance compared to the simple tube solar air heater, which has 43.7% more turbulence. In the investigated range, the roughened surface solar air heater had a high Nusselt number 3.15 times more than the plain tube solar heater with a comparable roughness value of 7.14 at a Reynolds number (Re) of 15,000. Case-4 solar-powered air heater with roughened surfaces reached a maximum temperature of 406.4 K

Optimization of the Hydrodynamic Performance of a Wave Energy Converter in an Integrated Cylindrical Wave Energy Converter-Type Breakwater System

AbstractWave energy converters (WECs) are built to extract wave energy. However, this kind of device is still expensive for commercial utilization. To cut down the cost of WECs by sharing the construction cost with breakwaters, an integrated cylindrical WEC-type breakwater system that includes a cylindrical WEC array in front of a very long breakwater is proposed to extract wave energy and attenuate incident waves. This paper aims to optimize the performance of the integrated cylindrical WEC-type breakwater system. A computational fluid dynamics tool, openfoam®, and a potential flow theory-based solver, HAMS®, are utilized. openfoam® provides viscosity corrections to a modified version of HAMS® in order to accurately and efficiently predict the integrated system’s performance. Parametric studies are conducted to optimize the integrated system, and a novel setup with an extra arc structure is found to significantly improve the performance of the integrated system.

Numerical simulation of binary component separation with perforated-on sheets of the structured packing

In this research work, we proposed a modern structured packing (SP) with perforated sheets with a specific surface area of 860[Formula: see text][Formula: see text]/[Formula: see text], which was determined using numerical techniques. This work aims to evaluate the major characteristics of PACK-860 for instance, height equivalent to a theoretical plate (HETP), dry pressure drop (DPD) and wet pressure drop (WPD). Additionally, the flow construction was defined for specific packing via computational simulation. To evaluate the value of HETP, DPD and WPD, the three-dimensional (3D) computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation with the Eulerian–Eulerian (EE) multi-phase method applied in this paper. According to the findings of this research, the performance of the mass transfer (MT), WPD and DPD was enhanced with the perforated-on sheets of packing. Based on the observation, numerical results are consistent well with the theoretical data which reveals the consistency of CFD tools for modeling methods to separation applications.

Design and Fluid Analysis of a Novel Power Supply Unit for Unmaned Marine Equipment

The problem of insufficient power supply for unmanned marine equipment at sea limits its development and utilization. In this paper, we designed a power supply unit capable of absorbing wave energy and converting it into electricity, which helps to solve the problem of limited power supply ability. Its main structure is demonstrated by theoretical design and modeling, and its operating principle is presented. Its performance (power coefficient and torque coefficient) was numerically simulated via Computational Fluid Dynamics tools, and the effect of blade groups’ solidity on its operating performance was investigated. The study found that the blades of the blade groups can absorb more energy by arranging along the outer ring, and the energy conversion efficiency of the blade groups is related to their load.

Numerical investigation of aerodynamically efficient wing tip-mounted propeller configuration using coupled RANS–BEM approach

Purpose Recent interest in electric aircraft has opened avenues for exploring innovative concepts and designs. Because of its potential to increase wing aerodynamic efficiency, the idea of wing tip-mounted propellers is becoming more popular in the context of electric aircraft. This paper aims to address the question of which configuration, tractor or pusher at wing tip is more beneficial. Design/methodology/approach The interactions between the wing and tip-mounted propellers in tractor and pusher configurations have been studied computationally. In this study, the propeller is modeled as a disk, and the blade element method (BEM) coupled with the computational fluid dynamics (CFD)–Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) solver is used to calculate propeller blade loading recursively. A direct comparison between the wing with tip-mounted propellers in tractor and pusher configurations is made by varying the direction of rotation and thrust. Findings Wing with tip-mounted propellers having inboard-up rotation is found to offer less drag in tractor and pusher configurations than those without propeller cases. Wing tip-mounted propeller in tractor configuration with inboard-up rotation offers higher wing aerodynamic efficiency than the other configurations. In tractor and pusher configurations with inboard-up rotating propellers, wing tip vortex attenuation is seen, whereas with outboard-up rotating propellers, the wing tip vortex amplification is observed. Originality/value SU2, an open-source CFD tool, is used in this study and BEM is coupled to perform RANS–BEM simulations. Both qualitative and quantitative comparisons were made between the tractor and pusher configurations, which may find its value when a question arises about the aerodynamically best propeller configuration at wing tips.

A new methodology to estimate the gas ascending time from underwater gas releases

Accidental subsea gas releases can pose a threat to people, equipment, and facilities since gas can be toxic or flammable at the concentrations in which the leak occurs. The accurate prediction of the behavior of the gas plume formed in the leaks can be fundamental to the development of techniques of accident prevention or, in some cases, remediation measures, avoiding the emergence of more serious consequences. Among the different ways to analyze the behavior of gas plumes formed underwater, the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) tool stands out for allowing the study of plume behavior to be done in a safer, simpler, and less expensive way, if compared to experimental studies. Inspired by the accidental release of the subsea gas scenario, this work validated a CFD setup of a 2D two-phase air–water flow using the VOF method in Ansys Fluent. The use of the VOF method differs this work from other works that use a hybrid Eulerian–Lagrangian methodology to model such types of flow. In this validation, simulations with a 9 m base tank, and 7 m water depth, and 0.050, 0.100, and 0.450 m3/s gas flow were performed. The simulated data were compared to experimental results available in literature. After the validation of the setup, a study was carried out varying the size of the leak to 0.24 and 0.17 m, and the gas flow from 0.006 to 0.150 m3/s aiming to verify how some plume characteristics are affected by the changes. Finally, following the directions from literature for analyzing the ascending gas behavior, and combining it with a dimensional analysis of the data, we proposed a mathematical model for calculating the gas ascending time using only properties of the gas leak. With future modifications of the proposed methodology, we hope that soon it will be possible to simulate gas releases under more realistic conditions. Even so, the findings of this work are already a significant step forward in the study of underwater gas releases.

Performance evaluation of a single-side windcatcher in the transitional seasons (case study: Khousf town, Southern Khorasan Province, Iran)

PurposeLife experience in hot and arid areas of Iran has proved that in the transitional seasons (spring and autumn) in which the climate is not too hot, passive cooling systems such as windcatchers (baadgir) have functioned well. This paper intends to investigate the efficiency of a single-side windcatcher as a passive cooling strategy; the case study is the Bina House windcatcher, located in Khousf town, near Birjand city, Iran.Design/methodology/approachTo achieve the aim, air temperature, relative humidity, wind data and mean radiant temperature were measured by the related tools over five days from September 23 to October 23. Then, the thermal performance of the windcatcher was examined by analyzing the effects of all these factors on human thermal comfort. Quantitative assessment of the indoor environment was estimated using DesignBuilder and its computational fluid dynamics (CFD) tool, a thermal comfort simulation method to compare the cooling potential of the windcatcher. Windcatcher performance was then compared with two other common cooling systems in the area: single-side window, and evaporative cooler.FindingsThe results showed that both windcatcher and evaporative cooler can provide thermal comfort for Khousf residents in the transitional seasons; but the difference is that an evaporative cooler needs to consume water and electricity power, while a windcatcher is a passive cooling system that uses clean energy of wind.Originality/valueThe present study, by quantitative study of single-side windcatchers in a desert region, measured the climatic factors of a historical house and compared it with thermal comfort criteria. Therefore, the results of field measurements were analyzed, and the efficiency of the windcatcher was compared with two other cooling systems, namely single-side ventilation and evaporative cooler, in the two seasons of summer and autumn (transition seasons).