A TWO-DIMENSIONAL NUMERICAL STUDY OF WIND SHELTERING EFFECTS OF SHELTERBELTS

Based on the dynamic and thermodynamic equations in the SBL,the protection characteristics and mechanism of shelterbelts are numerically studied in this paper.The results are in consistent with those observed in fields and wind-tunnels.Research shows that the belts with a permeability of 0.3-0.4 have the maximum sheltering effects.The distance where wind speed reduces at least by 20% is at 18-19 times of tree height (H) behind belts.The protection distance reduces fast with the increase of the permeability and slowly with its decrease.The belts have weaker sheltering effects in upstream,generally beyond 6H in front of belts there are no sheltering effects.In addition,the belts with low permeability at top and high permeability at bottom have much better sheltering effects than the belts with high permeability at top and low permeability at bottom.The belts with 50% overall permeability reduce wind speed at least,by 20% at the distance of 5H on the leeward side and by 10% at 11H.When the air is unstable,the protecting effects will be reduced.For the uniform belts with a permeability of 0.35,the distance where wind speed reduces at least by 20% is 15H under the unstable air and 13H under very unstable air.The belts reduce the turbulent diffusion coefficient at the bottom of belts,but increase it at the top.