AN EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF SINGLE SLOPED BASIN TYPE SPHERICAL FLOATING JUTE CLOTH ABSORBERS SOLAR STILL

In this work, an experimental study was conducted in Rewa, India for improving the performance of single sloped basin type solar still. For this purpose, multiple spherical floating jute cloth absorbers are floated over the surface of basin water of still. Due to low thermal capacity and capillary property of porous absorbers, a high rate of evaporation of water was obtained, resulting in more productivity. The effect of solar radiation, ambient temperature, absorber temperature, glass cover temperature, basin water temperature, hourly and daily distillate output and daily efficiency of modified and conventional stills were studied. It is observed that the modified solar still gives 46.33% higher distillate output over the conventional still. The daily efficiency of modified still was 55.73%, which is higher than that of the conventional still.