Influence of Nano Phase Change Materials on the Desalination Performance of Double Slope Solar Still

Abstract

Solar still is the ancient low cost device to distillate the saline water. Paraffin is a kind of phase change material which has a thermal storage characteristic and it can absorb and release a large amount of latent heat during the phase transition process. Ethylene Glycol was used as a PCM to study the thermal characteristics of water and absorption rate. A Nano phase change material plays a vital role in solar energy conversion and is used to enhance the thermal conductivity behavior on thermal energy storage systems. Materials at the nanoscale have a larger surface area and it has higher thermal properties than the macro particles. Incorporating NPCM into basin material helps to improve the productivity and the evaporation rate. The performance of the single basin double slope solar still was higher than the single slope solar still. Despite significant efforts, there are some challenges, such as the thermo physical properties of basin material, flow rate, insulation material and thickness that must be overcome in order for this technique to be useful in practice. In this paper, a detailed comparison of the various solar stills, designs, fabrications and water production analyses are discussed. Hence it is confirmed that NPCM has a higher potential than PCM for saline water desalination processes. This study confirmed that the Paraffin composites are stable up to 160°C and it increases the efficiency due to increased thermal properties of NPCM.