Modeling of Natural Ventilation Rates for Mexican Greenhouses

Natural ventilation is widely used in Mexico as a method for greenhouse cooling, and although several researchers around the world have studied it by applying both theoretical and experimental techniques, there are still gaps that must be explored and analyzed, which arise mainly because the greenhouse climate developed under natural ventilation is closely related to highly-changing external conditions of the environment. In this project, ventilation rates are calculated by using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) as theoretical approach, results of which are compared to the solution from tracer gas technique that is an experimental approach of the problem. It is therefore possible to relate the effect of natural ventilation rates on internal air temperature through mass and energy balances that lead to mechanistic modeling, in which we make an intensive use of the empirical models obtained.

Cooperators: Dr Gene Giacomelli, Dr Christopher Choi, Dr Irineo Lopez