Balconies influention on buildings natural ventilation: pressure coefficients determination through experimental trials in wind tunnel

Abstract

Facade elements may impact the performance of natural ventilation in buildings. This research investigated the influence of balconies on the natural ventilation performance of a high-rise building located in Sao Paulo's city center, by analyzing its envelope wind pressure coefficients. Wind tunnel experiments were performed in the atmospheric boundary layer wind tunnel from the Instituto de Pesquisas Tecnológicas (IPT), Sao Paulo, by using reduced scale models with and without balconies of different lengths and depths, in order to obtain envelope wind pressure coefficients for different wind directions. Results were used to generate isoline graphics, by applying Origin software. Results show that balconies are obstruction elements to natural ventilation, once its presence caused a reduction of the wind pressure difference between inlet and outlet openings. However, there were no significative changes on the natural ventilation performance by using two different depths of balconies.