Influence of night natural ventilation on Tunisian summer thermal comfort

For the Tunisian summer climate, which is hot and fairly wet, natural ventilation is the main passive strategy to reduce overheating. In this particular context, a three-dimensional calculation model of coupled heat transfer and airflow has been developed. It enables the evaluation of temperature field and air distribution between and within rooms under transient conditions. Its coupling with a thermal comfort model allows the evaluation of the thermal quality of a building by the prediction of a comfort indicator. This paper presents an application of the coupled simulation tool dealing with the influence of the night natural cross-ventilation strategy, upon the summer thermal comfort of an unconditioned Tunisian building under real meteorological conditions. We have particularly take interest to the thermal sensation of the building's occupant. The obtained results have shown the efficiency of the night natural ventilation to cool buildings during summer season and thus to improve thermal comfort in our context.