Analyses of wall surface condensation risk, based on CFD model with conventional room radiator

Abstract

Abstract The presented paper reveals a numerical study of the risk of condensation over exterior wall of a typical residential room. The study is based on CFD methods with implemented conjugate heat transfer. The analysis is contributed by a study of the impact of the heat released from conventional room radiator with various heat loads. This way, the resulting surface and dew point temperature distributions are derived over the simulated exterior wall. The results demonstrate that with the increase of the room relative humidity, the percentage of the external wall area, which might be affected by condensation increases significantly. This effect is observed regardless of the selected increase of the radiator heat load (in this particular study, the range is between 1000 W and 1500 W). For the range of relative humidity values from 40% to 60%, the area with increased risk of condensation increases to above 80%. This result demonstrates the crucial importance of the control of the room relative humidity within occupied premises, especially if condensation mitigation measures must be applied. The presented analyses and assessment method are rather innovative for the presented engineering area and would be in help in the buildings and indoor environment design process.