COMPUTATIONAL FLUID DYNAMICS MODEL OF THE VENTILATION AIR FLOW FOR A PROTECTIVE ENVIRONMENT ROOM

Abstract

The outbreak of infectious diseases in the healthcare environment has prompted the need to study the efficacy of patients' protection inside a protective environment (PE) room. The main objective of this study is to develop a computational fluid dynamics model for a PE room. The development involved the selection of a turbulence equation and an optimum finite volume size. Prior to selecting the optimum finite volume size, grid convergence test was carried out on the model. Subsequently, the model was validated with a set of experimental data for the selection of the right turbulence equation. The results revealed that the optimum element size is 0.06 m with the realizable k-epsilon turbulence equation as a suitable equation for the room's air flow. The resultant model has laid an important foundation for future simulation studies on the PE room in any healthcare setting.