Storing of energy in the form of latent or sensible heat is the best method in improving the performance of any thermal application. Desalination using renewable energy is the best method in getting potable water and due to its lower performance and yield it is not commercially available. The present investigation deals with improving potable water produced using nanomaterial in phase change material from a tubular solar still. Three different solar still namely TSS, TSS with PCM and TSS with NPCM were used in the present study and tested under the climatic conditions of Chennai, India. The thermal conductivity of graphene oxide nanoparticle in PCM acts as the key role in improving the thermal performance as the thermal conductivity of NPCM improved by 52% compared to that of PCM without nanoparticle. There is no significant improvement in the thermal conductivity of nano enhanced PCM with concentration beyond 0.3%. With a significant improvement in the thermal conductivity of NPCM, the water temperature increased by 7 °C and 3 °C as compared to TSS loaded with PCM and TSS without PCM respectively. The maximum enhancement in temperature of NPCM is found as 24% and the temperature is higher during off shine hours compared to that of PCM without nanoparticle. Similarly, with improved water temperature using NPCM as energy material, the evaporation rate from the absorber is improved by 41.3%, whereas, the average EHTC for TSS and TSS loaded with PCM alone is improved by 32.76 and 34.32% respectively. The total cumulative yield produced per m area from TSS, TSS with PCM, and TSS with NPCM is found to be 2.59, 3.35 and 5.62 kg respectively. Results also revealed that the daily efficiency of TSS with NPCM is improved to about 116.5% and comparatively higher than TSS with PCM and conventional tubular solar still.

中文翻译：

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使用相变材料（NPCM）中的氧化石墨烯纳米颗粒生产淡水的管式太阳能蒸馏器的实验研究

以潜热或显热形式存储能量是提高任何热应用性能的最佳方法。使用可再生能源进行海水淡化是获得饮用水的最佳方法，但由于其性能和产量较低，无法商业化。目前的研究涉及改善使用管式太阳能蒸馏器中的相变材料中的纳米材料生产的饮用水。本研究中使用了三种不同的太阳能蒸馏器，即 TSS、带 PCM 的 TSS 和带 NPCM 的 TSS，并在印度金奈的气候条件下进行了测试。PCM中氧化石墨烯纳米粒子的导热率在提高热性能方面发挥着关键作用，NPCM的导热率比不含纳米粒子的PCM提高了52%。浓度超过0.3%的纳米增强PCM导热系数没有明显改善。随着NPCM热导率的显着提高，与加载PCM的TSS和未加载PCM的TSS相比，水温分别提高了7℃和3℃。与不含纳米粒子的 PCM 相比，NPCM 的温度最大提高了 24%，并且在非光照时段温度更高。同样，使用 NPCM 作为能源材料提高水温后，吸收器的蒸发率提高了 41.3%，而 TSS 和仅加载 PCM 的 TSS 的平均 EHTC 分别提高了 32.76 和 34.32%。TSS、带有 PCM 的 TSS 和带有 NPCM 的 TSS 每平方米的总累积产量分别为 2.59、3.35 和 5.62 千克。结果还显示，采用 NPCM 的 TSS 的日效率提高至约 116.5%，相对高于采用 PCM 的 TSS 和传统管式太阳能蒸馏器。