Research and design of an improved solar still for desalination

Abstract

Water is one of the most important resources on Earth because of its vital role for human beings and other living creatures. During the devastating drought in the Mekong Delta in 2016, millions of people had no access to the secure source of fresh water. This issue cautioned and influenced the Vietnamese government to find an effective desalination process for the coastal areas impacted heavily by salinization. However, desalination processes require large amounts of energy which can be a problem for the coastal areas due to the lack of energy and high cost. The main purpose of the study herein was to find an alternative solution for desalination by designing a desalination system using solar energy. The design was expected to provide a small size desalination system for households. The average output of the system was about 854 ml/day with the productivity at 2223.54 ml/day/m2. The average water capture efficiency was 80.5%, the salt elimination efficiency of the system was about 99.99%, and the salinity of the output water was below 2 ppm. The results are still far from ideal but they indicate a potential solution for coping with the shortage of fresh water in coastal areas.