Abstract

Performance Analysis of Wick Type Solar Stills A Review

Author(s): K. Udhayabharathi, P. Baskar, S. Mohhammed Shafee and R. Sathish Babu

In this paper an attempt has been made to study and analyse various designs of wick type solar stills used in domestic, commercial and industrial applications. Under various Indian climatic conditions, the floating wick type solar stills can produce higher output of 6.25 Litres per square metre of absorber plate area during the month of June. It is also observed that the productivity of the wick type solar stills can be improved to around 53% by integrating the solar stills with fins by enhancing the heat transfer coefficients. The daily yield of the distilled water can be increased by around 14% to 34% by using various inclination angles and reflectors in the solar stills. The average annual values of convective heat transfer coefficient for the passive and hybrid active solar stills were observed as 0.78 and 2.41 W/m2K.