Numerical study on supply parameters’ influence on ventilation performance of a personalized air conditioning system for sleeping environments

Personalized air conditioning systems are widely used in sleeping environments, where a sleeping human body is always immobile through night. The ventilation performance optimization of air conditioning system becomes necessary, and the influences from different supply air parameters were investigated in this study, including supply air flow rate and temperature, supply air outlet height and fresh air flow rate. To understand the effects of supply air parameters on ventilation performance, the occupied zone air flow field, air change efficiency, CO₂ concentrations and CO₂ concentrations distributions inside the room were numerically studied. It was indicated that placing the supply air outlet at lower levels of 1.1 and 0.8 m could directly deliver cooling air to the thermal manikin, leading to a much higher air change efficiency of around 70%. The air temperature of the occupied zone could not be well cooled down for the supply air outlet at a height of 0.8 m. Meanwhile, the higher supply air flow rate may cause significant draft risk. Finally, considering the ventilation performance and draft risk, a set of the supply parameters is suggested for this personalized air conditioning system.