PERFORMANCE STUDY OF A PHASE CHANGE MATERIAL ASSISTED SOLAR STILL

A Solar still is a simple device, which is used to produce drinking water using energy of sun. Its low productivity is of great concern. Lauric acid is used as energy storage medium in the solar still to produce drinking water in the off sunshine hours. To examine the effects of use of PCM in the solar still for same total daily solar intensity on energy and exergy efficiency, experiments were carried out on two similar double slope solar still at Allahabad (250 28?N, 810 54?E) U.P. India. PCM is used in one of the still for the purpose of comparison with conventional still. It is observed that the exergy efficiency increases by 40% when lauric acid is used as energy storage medium in the solar still.