Edinburgh Napier University

  The building sector is responsible of some 40% of the total energy consumption in the world. Cooling energy is an important part of the energy needed in buildings and is increasing as a result of the higher levels of indoor air conditions and the global warming problem. In order to contribute in making a sustainable built environment and mitigate the energy consumption due to cooling, indirect evaporative cooling (IEC) can provide an energy efficient and environmentally friendly cooling method. The top advantage of the regenerative-type IEC process presented in this paper is its ability to supply product air at a temperature close to the dew point temperature without increasing the air moisture content. This research aims to find the indoor air temperature in an office room in Qatar by modelling and simulating a regenerative-type of IEC. A new component model is created and implemented in the whole building simulation program IDA Indoor Climate and Energy (IDA ICE4) using the Neutral Model Format (NMF) and is verified by an inter-model comparison. A case study is conducted where the performance of the regenerative-type IEC system is assessed in an office room located in Qatar. The results suggest that the regenerative-type of IEC is capable of improving the indoor air temperature conditions and eliminating the cooling energy demand by 55% for the office room when integrated with external shading (0.7m*0.7m) with air change rate of (2 l/s.m2). The indoor air operative temperature over 27 is reduced by 60% and the peak indoor air temperature is decreased from 50 to 41.7 using the IEC alone. In order to achieve comfort indoor air temperatures in Qatar climate, a hybrid combination of the IEC and a vapour-compression machine can comprise an energy efficient solution.