Experimental Analysis and CFD Modeling for Conventional Basin-Type Solar Still

Mahmoud S. El-Sebaey, Asko Ellman, Ahmed Hegazy and Tarek Ghonim
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Mahmoud S. El-Sebaey: Mechanical Power Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Menoufia University, Sheben El-Kom 32511, Egypt
Asko Ellman: Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences, Tampere University, 33720 Tampere, Finland
Ahmed Hegazy: Mechanical Power Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Menoufia University, Sheben El-Kom 32511, Egypt
Tarek Ghonim: Mechanical Power Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Menoufia University, Sheben El-Kom 32511, Egypt

Energies, 2020, vol. 13, issue 21, 1-17

Abstract: With the rising population, environmental pollution, and social development, potable water is reducing and being contaminated day by day continually. Thus, several researchers have focused their studies on seas and oceans in order to get potable fresh water by desalination of their saltwater. Solar still of basin type is one of the available technologies to purify water because of free solar energy. The computational fluid dynamic CFD model of the solar still can significantly improve means for optimization of the solar still structure because it reduces the need for conducting large amount of experiments. Therefore, the main purpose of this study is presenting a multi-phase, three-dimensional CFD model, which predicts the performance of the solar still without using any experimental measurements, depending on the CFD solar radiation model. Simulated results are compared with experimental values of water and glass cover temperatures and yield of fresh water in climate conditions of Sheben El-Kom, Egypt (latitude 30.5° N and longitude 31.01° E). The simulation results were found to be in acceptable agreement with the experimental measured data. The results indicated that the daily simulated and experimental accumulated productivities of the single-slope solar still were found to be 1.982 and 1.785 L/m 2 at a water depth of 2 cm. In addition, the simulated and experimental daily efficiency were around 16.79% and 15.5%, respectively, for the tested water depth.

Keywords: CFD ANSYS; thermal desalination; solar still; Egyptian climate (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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