Ventilation airflow within a gas turbine enclosure to assess cooling and safety performance

ATEX Enclosure Ventilation & Safety CFD Analysis

Supporting safe, compliant and reliable plant operation

Gas-turbine and generator enclosures must provide effective ventilation, heat removal and gas dispersion control while meeting safety and regulatory requirements. Inadequate airflow distribution or poorly understood leak scenarios can compromise safety, reliability and operability.

Navier provides CFD-based enclosure ventilation and safety analysis to support design reviews, operational assessments and safety-case documentation for power-generation facilities.

Enclosure airflow and thermal behaviour

We apply CFD to assess how air actually moves through turbine and generator enclosures, including:

Internal airflow distribution and ventilation effectiveness
Thermal stratification and hot-spot identification
Equipment heat-rejection modelling
Impact of inlet and outlet vent placement
Sensitivity to wind conditions and external pressure effects

These studies help ensure that cooling air reaches critical equipment and that heat is effectively removed under all operating conditions.

Gas dispersion and hazardous-area assessment

For enclosures handling fuel gas or other hazardous fluids, CFD provides valuable insight into dispersion behaviour following credible leak scenarios.

Typical analyses include:

Fuel-gas leak dispersion and accumulation
Influence of ventilation rate and airflow patterns
Identification of stagnation zones
Support for hazardous-area classification
Assessment of detection coverage and response time

CFD helps visualise risk, test assumptions and support proportionate mitigation measures.

ATEX and safety-case support

Navier’s enclosure studies are often used to support safety reviews and regulatory submissions, including:

Ventilation effectiveness assessment
Gas-detector placement and sensitivity analysis
Support for ATEX and DSEAR documentation
Evidence for package design reviews and approvals

Our analysis complements traditional safety studies by providing a physics-based understanding of ventilation and dispersion behaviour.

Standards and guidance

Our work aligns with recognised safety guidance for gas turbine exhaust and enclosure systems, including ISO 21789 and the UK HSE PM84 guidance. CFD is used to assess ventilation effectiveness, gas dispersion behaviour and thermal conditions in line with these principles, supporting compliant and defensible designs.

New-build, retrofit and operational studies

We support both new equipment packages and existing installations, including:

Design verification for new enclosures
Troubleshooting of ventilation or overheating issues
Assessment of modified layouts or equipment upgrades
Evaluation of reduced ventilation or degraded scenarios

CFD allows risks to be assessed before changes are implemented on site.

Why Navier?

Navier provides enclosure ventilation CFD as an engineering decision-support tool, not a box-ticking exercise.

Independent, vendor-neutral advice
Clear linkage between analysis and safety outcomes
Experience across power-generation equipment packages
Practical recommendations grounded in real operation

Enclosure Ventilation & ATEX CFD Analysis