Enhancing hemispherical solar still yield via wick materials and glass cover cooling
Mohammed El Hadi Attia, A.E. Kabeel, Abdelkader Bellila, Wael M. El‐Maghlany, Mohamed Abdelgaied, S.A. El-Agouz, Moataz M. Abdel‐Aziz
Abstract
ABSTRACT Hemispherical solar still with 8 mm thick wick materials at the bottom of its basin increases freshwater yield. Three 0.1 m 2 hemispherical solar devices were utilized for the experimental study. The system was experimentally tested in three ways for consecutive days. The first basin was a traditional one (THSS), the second basin was completely covered with a wick with 8 mm thickness (THSS-W), and the third basin was completely covered with the wick with a thickness of 8 mm and the glass cover cooling at a rate of 2 L/h (THSS-WC). The results showed that the wick utilization in the hemispherical basin gave high production compared to the traditional one. However, the glass surface cooling in addition to the wick utilization gave the best yield enhancement. The system with a traditional hemispherical basin provided a distillate of 3.25 L/m 2 , the system with a hemispherical basin covered with a wick provided a distillate of 4.55 L/m 2 , while the system with a hemispherical basin covered with a wick and the glass cover cooling produced a distillate of 5.5 L/m 2 . Accordingly, THSS-W and THSS-WC yields increased by 40% and 69.23%, respectively, when compared to THSS yield. The economic feasibility presented that the dual utilization of the wick and the glass cover cooling (THSS-WC) reduced the total cost of distillates produced from hemispherical solar distillers by 38.4% compared to THSS.