Middle East and Africa
Green Field Factory Project, Dubai
As part of the client’s value engineering process, WINDTECH Consultants undertook wind tunnel testing to accurately determine the design wind loads for the roof and façade cladding for the entire factory facility located in the industrial precinct in Dubai. The effect of the internal pressures on the net design pressures was determined based on the effect of the various roof and perimeter walls openings for the facility. The wind tunnel analysis was able to optimise the design of the cladding and associated fixings to keep the project economic.
Due to the site’s location and energy restrictions and to satisfy sustainability objectives, a natural ventilation study was carried out to optimise the mechanical ventilation system used. This study used a hybrid modelling technique using the results from the wind tunnel study to accurately determine the boundary conditions at the various openings. This information was combined with information on local wind speeds, temperatures and humidity as well as the head loads from various sources within the factory and the thermal properties of the various wall and roof constructions into a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) model to accurately determine the internal temperature and air quality for the workers.
Windtech were able to provide the client with optimised opening layouts to significantly improve the expected internal temperature as well as air-changes (for air quality). This resulted in a reduction in the scale of the required mechanical system in comparison to that originally anticipated.
