Wind suitability in site analysis of coastal concave terrains using computational fluid dynamics simulation： a case study in East Asia

The effect of wind environment is becoming increasingly important in analyzing and selecting sites for better naturalventilation of residential buildings, external comfort, and pollution dispersion. The mainpurpose of this study was to develop a setof methods for wind environment assessment in coastal concave terrains. This set of methods can be used to provide quantifiableindicators of preferable wind conditions and help site analysis. Firstly, a total of 20 types of coastal bays with concave terrains inEast Asia were characterized to find ideal locations. The selected areas were divided into five categories according to the mainterrain features. Then a sample database for the concave terrains was compiled for modelling comparisons. Secondly, a number ofkey wind variables were identified. Computational fluid dynamics （CFD） models of the typical coastal concave terrains identifiedas a result of the study were created, and the local wind environments were simulated with input from geographic informationsystem （GIS） and statistic package for social science （SPSS） analysis. A measure of wind suitability was proposed that takes windvelocity and wind direction into account using GIS. Finally, SPSS was used to find the relationship between wind suitability andkey terrain factors. The results showed that wind suitability was significantly associated with terrain factors, especially altitude.The results suggest that residential building sites should be selected such that their bay openings face the direction of the prevailingwind and that the opposite direction should be avoided.