Higher-Order Finite Elements for Computing Thermal Radiation

Two variants of the finite-element method have been developed for use in computational simulations of radiative transfers of heat among diffuse gray surfaces. Both variants involve the use of higher-order finite elements, across which temperatures and radiative quantities are assumed to vary according to certain approximations. In this and other applications, higher-order finite elements are used to increase (relative to classical finite elements, which are assumed to be isothermal) the accuracies of final numerical results without having to refine computational meshes excessively and thereby incur excessive computation times. One of the variants is termed the radiation sub-element (RSE) method, which, itself, is subject to a number of variations. This is the simplest and most straightforward approach to representation of spatially variable surface radiation. Any computer code that, heretofore, could model surface-to-surface radiation can incorporate the RSE method without major modifications. In the basic form of the RSE method, each finite element selected for use in computing radiative heat transfer is considered to be a parent element and is divided into sub-elements for the purpose of solving the surface-to-surface radiation-exchange problem. The sub-elements are then treated as classical finite elements; that is, they are assumed to be isothermal, and their view factors and absorbed heat fluxes are calculated accordingly. The heat fluxes absorbed by the sub-elements are then transferred back to the parent element to obtain a radiative heat flux that varies spatially across the parent element. Variants of the RSE method involve the use of polynomials to interpolate and/or extrapolate to approximate spatial variations of physical quantities. The other variant of the finite-element method is termed the integration method (IM). Unlike in the RSE methods, the parent finite elements are not subdivided into smaller elements, and neither isothermality nor other unrealistic physical conditions are assumed. Instead, the equations of radiative heat transfer are integrated numerically over the parent finite elements by use of a computationally efficient Gaussian integration scheme.