50 years of computational wind engineering: past, present and future

In the past 50 years, Computational Wind Engineering (CWE) has undergone a successful transition from an emerging field into an increasingly established field in wind engineering research, practice and education. This paper provides a perspective on the past, present and future of CWE. It addresses three key illustrations of the success of CWE: (1) the establishment of CWE as an individual research and application area in wind engineering with its own successful conference series under the umbrella of the International Association of Wind Engineering (IAWE); (2) the increasing range of topics covered in CWE; and (3) the history of overview and review papers in CWE. The paper also outlines some of the earliest achievements in CWE and the resulting development of best practice guidelines. It provides some views on the complementary relationship between reduced-scale wind-tunnel testing and CFD. It re-iterates some important quotes made by CWE and/or CFD researchers in the past, many of which are still equally valid today and which are provided without additional comments, to let the quotes speak for themselves. Next, as application examples to the foregoing sections, the paper provides a more detailed view on CFD simulation of pedestrian-level wind conditions around buildings, CFD simulation of natural ventilation of buildings and CFD simulation of wind-driven rain on building facades. Finally, a non-exhaustive perspective on the future of CWE is provided.