In the present study for the first time, Taguchi approach was applied to specify the optimal condition of the parameters in the natural convection heat transfer of Al2O3 nanofluid for a partially heated cavity. The flow and energy equations are solved by the lattice Boltzmann method. The influence of the 5 factors including Rayleigh number, position, hot length, cold length, volume concentration of the Al2O3 nanoparticles is examined. The Nusselt number on the hot section is measured for the response factor. In Taguchi optimization method, the levels of every factor were fixed at 3 levels and the L27 orthogonal array. The conclusions of the Taguchi–LBM technique indicated that the optimum conditions were attained at the maximum Rayleigh number, cold length and volume fraction and the minimum hot length in the bottom–bottom configuration in the variety of the design parameters. Also, the most significant parameter influencing the Nusselt number on the hot wall was the Rayleigh number, while changing the volume fraction had a negligible effect.

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