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passive solar

Wind towers

John C Daley

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posted 1 year ago

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Middle Eastern Wind towers explained very well

Ancient-air-conditioner-300x200.jpg

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Anne Miller

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posted 1 year ago

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Is that concept similar to Air Wells?

Or do those wind towers only cool the air and not collect water?

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Pearl Sutton

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This type are made to move air only.

There are types designed to only move air, some to only harvest water, and every possible mix in between, depending on what the resource options were and what was needed most.

The hybrid ones interest me the most, as the area I'm in is humid, and water harvesting types end up with dry air coming out of them. They look like a dehumidifier for house intake air to me!

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John C Daley

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Anne, they only move air.
Often the building design includes water ponds inside a courtyard which adds moisture to any air passing through the house.

Mike Philips

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I can see how there’s a Venturi-like suction in the leeward side, but as I understand it there’s also a stagnation pressure on the windward side.

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Mike Philips

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We have giant concrete parking garages that seem to do this accidentally, if only due to their verticalness inducing convection and enormous thermal mass. It’s astonishing to walk by one on a hot summers day and feel it cooling the open air of an entire city block, for free, while everyone spends a small fortune to keep their a/c cranked.

Imagine what more this design could do for cooling if the wind scoop was closed during the day and solar-electric fans circulated the air. The structure wouldn’t even have to be vertical. (Or not entirely, like in a rocket mass heater). Anyway, loads of possibilities here, from traditional to modernized.

Abraham Palma

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This is what I call a ventilation chimney, but they are pipes with openings.

ventilation-chimney.jpg

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John C Daley

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Mike, I will look into the carpark issue you speak of.
It sounds interesting.
Abraham, I have built one for my home, it pulls hot air out and keeps a slight moving air stream through the house.

Pearl Sutton

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The carpark thought has me wondering about using the stack effect in cities to keep air moving. What if every building over 5 stories tall had a very well built 2 foot square tube on the exterior of the building (on a well insulated wall to keep it from affecting the temp of the building) that has closable damper type thing for winter, and just goes up 5 stories and ends in an open top. It might keep the air at ground level moving in the summer.

At the moment, I'm dealing with high heat index, muggy as hell, and not a lot of air movement. In a city like Atlanta or something, that HAS to be just miserable I wonder if stacks could keep the air moving at least.

I'd vote for keeping them at about 5 stories high, you get some really weird effects when you go much higher, it might be worse than not having them.
Wonder if this would work....

Edit: Might make fires MUCH worse though... hmm...

Jay Angler

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Somewhere I saw a video about a new design that covers skyscraper roofs with vertical access wind turbines. Apparently, this help to decrease that yucky street level wind, by encouraging the wind to go vertically upward.

Can't find it now, but maybe someone can. I don't think they were in production when I read about it, but I do think they had a trial one on a building in Germany or at least northern Europe.

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John C Daley

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I have see one in Germany, at a town which is experimental. I will try and find it.

John C Daley

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Research
"influence of thermal mass on thermal comfort and cooling"
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544220300918
"In temperate climate countries, passive cooling techniques are a reasonable alternative to electricity consumption for building air conditioning.
The phenomenon of thermal inertia in buildings is of particular importance as it can both improve thermal comfort and reduce energy consumption.....

...The cooling effect of the thermal mass of the building remained stable during the heat wave and was relatively independent of the duration and distribution of the hottest days.
The results of this research and discussion allow us to conclude that the use of concrete ground floors and walls made of cellular concrete in a detached,
energy-efficient single-family house combined with night ventilation and the use of external blinds or other sun shading devices can maintain the average temperature
inside the building at 25–26 °C even in the most severe heat wave conditions in a moderate climate countries,
and thus effectively prevent the installation of new air conditioners in residential buildings....
The use of high thermal mass in studied buildings reduced the demand for cooling energy by 67–75% depending on assumed temperature threshold."

Jay Angler

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John C Daley wrote:From linked article: "The use of high thermal mass in studied buildings reduced the demand for cooling energy by 67–75% depending on assumed temperature threshold."

Now if we can consider replacing some or all of the "concrete" thermal mass with rocks and cob in any climate suitable for it, we might get ahead?

I believe Sepp Holzer said that his original family home was made of many huge rocks in very thick walls and it was more comfortable in both the winter and the summer compared to new "stick built" local homes.

Are most of the wind-towers we see images of, made of clay bricks?

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Pearl Sutton

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Are most of the wind-towers we see images of, made of clay bricks?

Yes.
And they are built in arid places,where there is no rain to melt them if they were not fired, which most are not, because that requires a LOT of wood, that the desert does not have.

John C Daley

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Sebastian Köln

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I suspect the air temperature drops the higher the air is above the hot ground in that climate.
But I have far not found many publications that measured this.

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