Abstract
The low energy efficiency of the solar distillers is one of the key barriers to their effectual usage in the desalination domain. Hence, this work introduces an experimental investigation to enhance the freshwater productivity of the hemispherical solar distiller with different trays' configurations and utilizing wick materials. This was achieved by utilizing iron trays and wicks in the circular basin of hemispherical solar still in order to increase the vaporization surface area for better heat transfer of saline water. The performance of the hemispherical solar distiller was investigated with flat and v-corrugated iron trays configurations. Three distillers were designed and examined, namely, conventional hemispherical solar distiller, hemispherical solar distillery with flat iron trays, and hemispherical solar distiller with v-corrugated iron trays. Moreover, the combined effects of using wick materials with flat and v-corrugated iron trays in the basin of hemispherical distiller have been also investigated. Experiments were carried out at the desert climate conditions of El-Oued (33 degrees 27 ' N, 7 degrees 11 ' E), Algeria. The results showed that the productivity improvement is 42.85% and 14.30% over the conventional hemispherical distiller for v-corrugated and flat trays hemispherical solar still (HSD), respectively. While the inclusion of wick materials with v-corrugated iron trays further increases the productivity by about 83.12% over the reference distiller. Moreover, the energy efficiency of the flat trays HSD, v-corrugated trays HSD, HSD flat trays and wicks, and HSD v-corrugated trays and wicks is 38.72%, 48.28%, 52.16%, and 61.67%, respectively. Additionally, the .cost of freshwater production of HSD v-corrugated trays and wicks was 41.72% lower than that of a traditional hemispherical distiller.