NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF SINGLE AND DOUBLE SLOPE SOLAR STILL FOR DIFFERENT VARIABLES

Abstract

Water and the use of conventional energy sources are two significant problems in the world. Water is essential for sustenance. Human beings need of potable water at less consumption of non- renewable energy resources. There are many techniques to convert saline water into potable water. In this paper, three-phase, three dimensional a single slope and double slope single basin still both were prepared and simulated by using ANSYS FLUENT v19.2. Simulation results of solar stills were made by using evaporation as well as condensation process at the climate conditions of Delhi (27.0238° N, 74.2179° E). Within the scope of this study, simulation results of both systems were calculated and compared with each other. It is examined that the temperature inside the single slope solar still is maximum from 13:00 to 14:00 hrs while the double slope still has low temperature compared to the single still. The maximum and minimum temperature of the water-vapor mixture inside the single slope still were calculated 435.39K and 22.283K and the maximum and minimum temperature on glass were 379 K and 16.22 K whereas in double slope, the maximum and minimum temperature of the water-vapor mixture inside the still were 92.12K and 25.60K and glass temperature were 76.154K and 19.22K. Hence, due to the temperature difference between the glass surface and outer environment, more condensation will be in the single slope solar still. Inner water temperature is responsible for more evaporation and higher temperature more than 50℃ can be found in single slope solar still as compared to the double slope. The maximum water production rate in single slope solar still is 0.84 kg m-2 hr-1 while the maximum water production rate in the double slope is 0.26 kg m-2 hr-1 . In the simulation, all other variables are also checked and calculated, also observed single slope solar still has a high value of all variables which affect water production. Hence, the single slope solar still could be better there.