Current turbulence models for simulating natural convection require too much computation time or do not give sufficiently accurate results. A one-equation near-wall model is developed that incorporates the use of direct numerical simulation data (Ru = 5.4 x 10(5)) to remedy these shortcomings. The use of this near-wall model along with the standard k-epsilon model for the outer-wall region, yields good predictions for mean flow and turbulence in natural convection and significantly reduces computational cost.