Research on Thermal Comfort of Human Body Under Localized Automotive Air Conditioning

Abstract In this study, we design localized automotive air conditioning to balance the contradiction between the thermal comfort of the driver in the cockpit and the energy-saving and environmental protection of an automobile's air conditioner. The simplified model of a certain car cockpit is selected as the research object. Three types of air outlet structures of localized automotive air conditioning are designed, and numerical simulation is performed to study flow field distribution and human thermal comfort in the cockpit under different air outlet combinations of localized automotive air conditioning. The final evaluation result indicates that the thermal comfort of the driver is good under localized automotive air conditioning. Moreover, the energy-saving effect of localized automotive air conditioning is remarkable and its cooling rate is faster. Localized automotive air conditioning achieves about 41.4% more energy saving than ordinary automotive air conditioning.