THERMAL ANALYSIS OF EARTH AIR HEAT EXCHANGER USING CFD

This project focuses on Earth Air Heat Exchanger which is reducing energy consumption in a building. The air is passing through the buried tubes and heat exchange takes place between air and surrounding soil. This equipment helps to reduce energy consumption of an air conditioning unit. This project analyses the thermal performance of earth air heat exchanger by using computational fluid dynamics modeling. The model is validat ed against experimental observations and investigations on an experimental setup in Ajmer. Simulation results are in fair agreement with experimental data. Effects of pipe materials on thermal performance of earth air heat exchangers are also studied for s ummer conditions in Mumbai. Results have shown that the performance of earth air heat exchanger is not significantly affected by material of buried pipes.