Reducing roof solar heat gain by using double-skin ventilated roofs

Abstract EN

Double skin ventilated roof is one of the important passive cooling techniques to reduce solar heat gain through roofs.

In this research, an experimental study was performed to investigate the thermal behaviour of a double skin roof model.

The model was made of two parallel galvanized steel plates.

Galvanized steel has been used in the roof construction of industrial buildings and storehouses in Iraq.

The effect of inclination angle (ϴ) from the horizontal and the spacing (S) between the plates was investigated at different radiation intensities.

It is found that using a double skin roof arrangement with a sufficient air gap (S) can reduce the heat gain significantly.

The higher the inclination angle (ϴ) the higher the ventilation rate, the lower the heat gain through the roof.

In this study, increasing the air gap from 2 cm to 4 cm reduced the heat gain significantly but when the gap was further increased to 6 cm, the reduction in the heat flux was insignificant.

A dimensionless correlation was also reduced between Nusselt number () and the single parameter where L is the channel length.

This correlation can be handily utilized for designing of engineering applications dealing with high temperature difference natural convection heat transfer.