Optimal size of black gravel as energy storage materials for performance improvement of hemispherical distillers
Introduction
Clean water is very necessary for the life of living organisms, especially humans on the Earth. Economic production is also in dire need of clean water. The remote and isolated communities that do not have electricity are also facing problems in the lack of good quality drinking water. So the use of solar energy as clean alternative energy has become a modern, effective, and life-saving technology for many people, for the distillation of saline water and the production of drinking water using solar distillation [1], [2], [3], [4], [5].
The popularity of solar distillation stems from its simple construction, low operation, and maintenance costs, which are especially appealing in remote areas with limited resources. However, the low freshwater productivity of conventional solar distillation spurs many researchers to develop new methods to enhance stable productivity. Many researchers have presented many different techniques, all of which aim to increase productivity, represented in Graphite [6], El Oued sand grains [7], Al2O3-water nanofluid [8], tubular distiller with hollow fins with paraffin wax [9], wick corrugated absorber [10], copper tubes filled with paraffin wax in basin [11], phosphate pellets [12], pyramid distiller with hollow fins with paraffin wax [13], electrical heater in basin [14], multi-concentric pipes in basin [15], hot air injection in basin [16,17], v-corrugated absorber and phase change materials [18], cylindrical concentrator [19], tubular distiller [20], floating sponge [21], pin fins with external condenser [22], Phase change materials (PCM) [23,24], and hybrid storage materials [25].
Madhu [26] studied the influences of cuboidal boxes filled with sand (0.5 kg/box) located in the basin on the solar distiller's performance. They found that the utilization of cuboidal boxes filled with sand improves the efficiency of the solar distillers by 30% as compared to the reference distiller. Sakthivel and Shanmugasundaram [27] performed the influence of black granite gravel (6 mm size) on the behavior of solar distillers. The black granite gravel used was placed at the bottom of the solar distillers. The results showed that the yield of the solar distiller with utilize black granite gravel increased by 17–20% as compared to the reference distillers. Abdullah et al. [28] presented a comparison between the performance of four solar distillers with different absorbers. The first distiller is used as a reference, and the second, third, and fourth distiller contain uncoated, black coated metallic sponges, and black volcanic rocks, respectively. The results showed that the overall productivity improved by the following percentages of 28%, 43%, and 60% when using the uncoated, black coated metallic sponge and black volcanic rocks, respectively, compared to reference solar distiller. Nafey et al. [29] studied the behavior of solar still with black gravel. The results showed that the overall productivity improved by 19% when using black gravel (20–30 mm sizes), compared to reference solar distiller. Velmurugan et al. [30] conducted empirically the influences of the different absorbers (sponge cubes, wick, and fins) on the solar distiller behavior. The results showed that the utilization of fins enhanced the productivity by 45.5%, wick enhanced the productivity by 29.6%, and the sponges enhanced the productivity by 15.3%. Kannan et al. [31] conducted experiments in solar still with various absorbents (gravels, sand grains, and sponges, black rubber pieces) and black tubes filled with activated carbon-methanol placed in the bottom of the basin still. Sathyamurthy et al. [32] studied empirically the influences of spherical balls filled with 127 g of rock salt and different colored sponges placed in the basin on the performance of solar distillers. Barden [33] studied experimentally the influences of the asphalt basin liner and cooling of glass cover on the cumulative yield of the solar distillers. The results showed that the distiller productivity increased up to 51% when using asphalt basin liner and cooling of the glass cover. Panchal [34] studied empirically the behavior of solar still with storage materials (sandstones and marble pieces). The results showed that the sandstones enhanced the system yield by 30%, and the marble pieces enhanced the system yield by 14%. Nasri et al. [35] studied the performance improvement of a glass solar still by the use of different absorbers (gravel, polyethylene, and sand). The experimental results show that gravel, polyethylene, and sand produce the quantity of distilled water 5, 4.48, and 3.84 l/m2/day, respectively. They found that the best absorber is gravel and has the highest productivity as compared to the other absorbers. Murugavel et al. [36] compared six double-slope solar stills with different sensible heat storage materials. The results showed that the best heat storage material for increasing yield is quartzite rocks (size is 3/4 in). Dumka et al. [37] studied the influence of sand-filled cotton bags on still performance. The amount of saltwater in the basin was 30 and 40 kg, respectively. The obtained results showed an increase of 28.56% in the total output when using the sand-filled cotton bags at 40 kg of basin water, while an increase by 30.99% was achieved when using sand-filled cotton bags at 30 kg of basin water. Mousa and Naser [38] conducted an experimental and theoretical study to enhance the productivity of solar still containing phase change materials (PCM). By comparing the results, the numerical results, and the experimental measurements, they concluded that the theoretical model corresponds to the experimental measurements. Mousa et al. [39] investigated the productivity of a solar still with PCM (tricosan) in a submerged copper piper in the bottom of the basin still. They concluded that the utilization of tricosan improved the cumulative yield. Panchal et al. [40] presented a review of various techniques utilized to enhance the yield of tubular solar distillers. Pansal [41] presented a comprehensive review of the influences of photovoltaic on the yield of active solar distillers. Panchal ad Sadasivuni [42] offered a mini-review about the various design of external condensers utilized to improve the condensation rate of solar distillers.
The present study aims to achieve the highest hemispherical solar distiller's performance. In order to achieve this goal as well as to achieve the maximum possible benefit from the large surface area of receiving and condensing that characterizes the hemispherical solar distillers from the other traditional single-slope distillers, the utilization of the black gravel with different sizes represent a good choice to increase the rate of absorption of solar rays and as sensible heat storage materials. This will be increasing the temperature of the basin saltwater and improving the cumulative yield of hemispherical distillers. To obtain the best size of the black gravel that achieves the highest cumulative yield of hemispherical distillers, four different sizes of black gravel (4, 8, 11, 16 mm) were studied and compared to the reference hemispherical distiller under the same climatic conditions. To achieve this vision, three hemispherical solar distillers were made and constructed and tested at the same conditions. The experiments were carried out in two scenarios, in the first test scenario, two different sizes of black gravel (4 and 8 mm) were placed in the second and third hemispherical distiller (HSS-BG4 and HSS-BG8) and compared to the first hemispherical reference distiller (HSS-BSR). In the second test scenario, two different sizes of black gravel (11 and 16 mm) were placed in the second and third hemispherical distiller (HSS-BG11 and HSS-BG16) and compared to the first hemispherical reference distiller (HSS-BSR). They are compared under the same climatic conditions in El Oued-Algeria in May 2021.
Section snippets
Test-rig construction
The schematic diagram of hemispherical-basin solar still is designed as shown in Fig. 1, which is modified by providing black gravel as a storage medium in the hemispherical-basin. The conventional hemispherical solar still consists of the following components: (a) hemispherical basin; (b) circular wooden box; (c) Transparent cover; and (d) channel to collect drops condensate water. The still has a circular basin having an area of 0.1 m2 made of wood of 35 mm thickness.
The inner surfaces of the
Results and discussions
Three hemispherical solar distillers were operated in the experiments, which took place in the southeast of Algeria (06° 47′ E and 33° 30′ N) over two days in May 2021 (17, and 19). The experimental data was collected for eleven hours, from 8:00 am to 7:00 pm.
For the test days, Fig. 5 shows the hourly variation of solar intensity and ambient temperature starting at 8:00 am till 7:00 pm. The intensity of solar rays for the two test days is almost identical, increasing until it reaches its
Comparison of present study with published similar works
In Table 2, we compared our results with published similar works. From Table 2, it can be noticed that from the comparison results, the utilization of the hemispherical distiller with black gravel size of 16 mm utilized in this study represents the good chooses to achieve the highest cumulative productivity of hemispherical distiller.
Comparison between the daily yield obtained from HSS with gravel and HSS-BSR
The comparisons of daily distillate productivity are showed in Table 3. The experiments were conducted on May 17 and 19, 2021 from 8:00 AM to 7:00 PM for 11 h. As shown the daily distillate productivity of the HSS with black gravel is higher as compared with the reference distiller. The daily distillate productivity from the HSS-BSR, HSS-BG4, HSS-BG8, HSS-BG11, and HSS-BG16 reached 4900, 5700, 6450, 6900, and 7700 mL/m2/day.
Economic evaluation
Table 4, shows the fabrication cost of the HSS-BSR, HSS-BG4, HSS-BG8,
Conclusions
The empirical study aims to achieve the highest cumulative yield of hemispherical solar distillers. The gravels are a widely available and material at no cost especially in black color in Algeria, which can be utilized in this technique to increases the intensity of absorbed solar rays and as the energy storage medium. To achieves this idea, the influences of four different sizes of black gravels (4, 8, 11, and 16 mm) were studied to obtain the optimal sizes that achieve the highest cumulative
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Mohammed El Hadi Attia: Expermental work, Writing - original draft preparation. Abd Elnaby Kabeel: Conceptualization, Writing - Review & Editing.Supervisor. Mohamed Abdelgaied: Conceptualization, Methodology, Writing - Review & Editing. Moataz M. Abdel-Aziz: Formal analysis and investigation. Writing - Review & Editing. Abdelkader Bellila: Writing - original draft preparation. Abdelkader Abdullah: Writing revised version - Review & Editing.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
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