Experimental investigations on the performance of a single slope solar still with thermal energy storage

Solar stills have been proposed to be a feasible solution for the fresh water production from the saline water. However, the use of solar stills is limited due to their low production rate. The objective of the present investigation is to experiment the use of an inorganic phase changing material (InPCM) and the nano-doped InPCM on the performance of a single sloped conventional solar still (SSCSS) considering its water production rate. Three arrangements of the SSCSS were experimented in this study. The first one was the still having no InPCM (SSCSS/simple), the next one was still with an InPCM (SSCSS/InPCM) and third was the still with nano-doped InPCM (SSCSS/nano-InPCM), respectively. Sodium acetate trihydrate had been used the InPCM and a low fraction (0.75 wt%) of magnesium oxide nanoparticles (nano-MgO) were used as the additive in InPCM, while preparing nano-doped InPCM. The experiments were piloted with such three arrangements of solar still on the days having similar atmospheric conditions and the results were analyzed. The outcome evinced that the use of InPCM and nano-InPCM augmented the water collection rate of the SSCSS by 26.63% and 45.23%, respectively comparing to the simple SSCSS. Further, the infusion of nano-MgO had shown a significant augmentation in the productivity of the solar still.