Study of Evaporative Heat and Mass Transfer in Solar Distillation

Abstract

Abstract In this work, the assessment of 3 experimental tests on a solar still is presented, where 4, 5 and 6 L of brine were utilized. Data of temperature in several parts of the device and of solar radiation were obtained, besides, the outlet volume water was measured every 5 minutes during a timelapse from 10:00 am to 18:00 pm, which is compared through a study of heat and mass transfer due to evaporation, with the aim of predicting de amount of distilled volume. Experimental results show that 2.7, 2.2 and 1.8 L are distilled for the initial volumes of 4, 5 and 6 L, respectively. However, when Dunkle’s thermal model is applied, the resulting distilled volumes are 2.2 2 and 1.7 L for the initial volumes of 4,5 and 6 L, respectively. This analysis indicates that the chosen thermal model has an error of approximately 4% compared with experiments. However, this model can be used to estimate accurately the outlet volume of distilled fluid.