Influence of Flow Rotation Within a Cooling Tower on the Aerodynamic Interaction with Crosswind Flow

Environmental crosswind changes the aerodynamic pattern inside a cooling tower, destroys uniform and axisymmetric distribution of flow at its inlet and outlet, and may degrade fill zone performance. In this paper, the effect of flow rotation in the over-shower zone of a natural draft cooling tower (NDCT) on the aerodynamic interaction with crosswind is studied numerically. The 3D geometry of an actual NDCT and three models of induced rotation velocity fields are utilized for simulation. It is demonstrated that flow rotation results in homogenization of the aerodynamic field in the over-shower zone. The inhomogeneity of the velocity field in the outlet cross section decreases linearly with rotation intensification. The effect of main stream switching under strong wind conditions is found. It is shown that even moderate flow rotation eliminates this effect.