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Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11

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Desalination

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/desal

A novel cogeneration system for sustainable water and power production


by integration of a solar still and PV module
M. Yari a,⁎, A.E. Mazareh b, A.S. Mehr a
a
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Tabriz, Tabriz, Iran
b
Young Researchers and Elite Club, Maragheh Branch, Islamic Azad University, Maragheh, Iran

H I G H L I G H T S

• A solar still integrated with evacuated tubes and semitransparent photovoltaic are proposed.
• Effect of basin water depth, number of ETC and types of PV modules are investigated.
• Performance of proposed systems is compared with similar systems.
• Using 30 tubes, the maximum distillated yield is obtained 2.76 kg for the depth of 0.07 m.
• The maximum electrical energy is achieved for the HIT with value of 70.47 W/m2.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Present work is an attempt to propose and analyze a new solar still equipped to semitransparent photovoltaic
Received 30 November 2015 and evacuated tube collector in natural mode. The system performance is investigated from various aspects
Received in revised form 23 May 2016 such as distilled water yield, instantaneous and daily electrical power production, instantaneous and daily energy
Accepted 6 July 2016
and exergy efficiencies considering six types of photovoltaic module as well as various basin water depths and
Available online 20 July 2016
number of tubes. Results show that type of photovoltaic module does not have a significant effect on distilled
Keywords:
water yield. However, it is revealed that increasing the number of tubes could increase the water yield. It is
Evacuated tube collector found that for a specific number of tubes, maximum water yield in a day occurs for basin depth of 0.07 m.
Photovoltaic Also, the higher number of tubes increases the distillate yield. The maximum water production (4.77 kg/
Solar still m2·day) is achieved for the basin depth of 0.07 m and 30 numbers of tube. It is revealed that for the HIT photo-
Energy and exergy efficiency voltaic module type the maximum instantaneous and daily electrical power are 70.48 W/m2 and 483.2 Wh/m2,
Distillation respectively. Also, maximum daily energy and exergy efficiencies are calculated 6.86% and 16.65%, respectively,
for basin depth of 0.07 m and tubes number of 10.
© 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction separate pure water molecules from contaminants with a higher boiling
point than water. In the distillation process, water is first heated until it
Water is a fundamental human need. Each person on earth requires reaches its boiling point and begins to evaporate. The stable tempera-
at least 20 to 50 l of clean, safe water a day for drinking, cooking, and ture ensures continued water vaporization, but prohibits drinking
simply keeping themselves clean. Polluted water isn't just dirty-it's water contaminants with a higher boiling point from evaporating.
deadly. Despite of developing countries' efforts, there are many regions Next, the evaporated water is captured and guided through a system
where healthy drinking water is scarce. More than 700 million people of tubes to another container. Finally, removed from the heat source,
still lack ready access to improved sources of drinking water; nearly the steam condenses back into its original liquid form. Contaminants
half are in sub-Saharan Africa [1]. This can cause lots of diseases related having a higher boiling point than water remain in the original contain-
to the unhealthy water. Impure and unhealthy water is much available er. This process removes most minerals, most bacteria and viruses, and
around us which can be purified and become healthy. One of the any chemicals that have a higher boiling point than water. For this rea-
methods for purification of water is distillation. The distillation process son, distillation is sometimes valued as a method of obtaining pure
utilizes a heat source to vaporize water. The object of distillation is to drinking water.
Distillation process needs energy to run, which can be obtained
⁎ Corresponding author. using the renewable energy sources such as solar. Solar powered distil-
E-mail address: myari@uma.ac.ir (M. Yari). lation of water can be defined as measures to separate and extract clean

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.desal.2016.07.004
0011-9164/© 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
2 M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11

water by vaporization. This can be particularly useful to turn seawater, by means of a solar still equipped with the evacuated tube collector in
brackish or even contaminated water into clean water safe for drinking. natural mode and semitransparent photovoltaic module instead of
Aybar [2] proposed a solar based distillation system producing dis- using the glass in the conventional solar still. To the best of our knowl-
tilled water and hot water simultaneously. The system is modeled and edge, there is not similar study in literature. The electrical and thermal
analyzed theoretically and effects of inlet water mass flow rate as well energy as well as the exergy efficiency has been evaluated for solar
as solar radiation rate on the performance of the system are investigat- still integrated with ETC and PV module. Effect of water depth in the
ed. Maximum and average hot water temperatures are obtained 60 and basin of solar still and number of ETC and six different types of PV mod-
40 °C suitable for domestic consumption, respectively. Ibrahim and ules (i) m-Si, (ii) p-Si, (iii) amorphous silicon (a-Si), (iv) cadmium tellu-
Elshamarka [3] developed a theoretical model for a basin liner equipped ride (CdTe), (v) copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS), and (vi) a
with an air-cooled condenser instead of conventional distillation system heterojunction comprised of a thin a-Si PV cell on top of a c-Si cell
with a glass. Also, the results are experimentally investigated to com- (also known as HIT) on electrical power and watery yield has been
pare with theoretical results. Results show that the performance of the calculated.
modified system is better than the conventional one. As the production
potential of passive solar distillation systems is low, there are several re- 2. System description and assumptions
searches in literature studying the feasibility of improving the active
solar distillation systems. To improve the common solar still perfor- The proposed system is illustrated in Fig. 1a. Referring to this figure,
mance two solutions could be considered; one, using auxiliary system, the system consists of a solar still integrated with ETC and semitranspar-
the temperature within the basin line would be increased, e.g. the meth- ent PV module where basin water of solar still is connected to the ETC.
od “two-phase thermosyphon heat pipe” is used for improving the per- Due to high temperature water in ETC and density difference at different
formance of solar collector [4]. Another way is use of heater for parts of ETC, hot water with low density moves to the top of the tube
preheating the inlet temperature of the basin line. The preheating pro- while water with lower temperature and higher density moves to the
cess could be done via Evacuated Tube Collector (ETC) and Flat Plate bottom. Consequently, water with high temperature enters the basin.
Collectors (FPC) both of which has its own advantages and disadvan- As shown in Fig. 2a, a semitransparent PV module with 30° slope is
tages. Not only is the design of FPC simple, but also the operating and installed on a solar still. It is assumed that there is not any air leakage
maintenance cost of this method is lower. However, FPCs are not able from the system. Also, the basin is painted in black color to absorb the
to follow the solar irradiation resulting in a lower efficiency. In addition, maximum level of sun radiation.
heat loss via convection is another disadvantage for FPCs. On the other When the solar radiation is received by the PV module, part of the ra-
hand, ETC systems have not the two disadvantages of FPCs as the ETC diation is absorbed by the PV resulting in produce electricity while some
is cylindrical as well as the existence of vacuum in the gap between remained parts are absorbed by water in the basin. The tubes with a
the two cylinders. ETC has lots of applications using the solar energy. 1.4 m length and inner diameter of 0.047 m (with an equal distance
Mehmet Esen [5] experimentally investigated a solar cooker, integrated from each other) are installed with a slope of 45° on the diffuse reflector
with ETC. The effect of using different refrigerant in ETC is analyzed and while connecting to the basin. The tubes consist of two symmetry cylin-
it is revealed that besides the environmental condition, type of refriger- ders. The inner cylinder is full of water and the gap between the two cyl-
ant has a great influence on solar cooker performance. inders is vacuumed in order to prevent the heat loss. In addition, the
Morad et al. [6] experimentally compared the performance of a dou- outer surface of inner cylinder is painted in black color to absorb the
ble slope solar distillation system in passive and active modes with and maximum possible sun radiation.
without cover cooling. Effects of basin depth water and upper glass In the present work, the system is simulated and modeled using the
thickness on the daily production are investigated. It is found that in numerical solving methods in MATLAB software. The module efficiency
the active mode daily water production is 22.3% more than that of the (μr,m) and temperature coefficient (βr,m) in the standard test condition
passive one. Singh et al. [7] analyzed the performance of an active for the six PV modules are listed in Table 1. Also, the specifications of
solar distillation system equipped with evacuated tube. The daily and the solar still and ETC are listed in Table 2. Basin water mass flow is as-
instantaneous water and electricity production as well as the energy sumed to be 30, 70 and 120 kg for water depth of 0.03, 0.07 and 0.12 m,
and exergy efficiencies are investigated. When the number of tubes is respectively.
kept to be 10, the maximum production of safe water occurs at the min- Considering the glass on the solar still, fractional solar fluxes are as-
imum water depth in the basin. The effects of tube number and water sumed α'w = 0.34, α'b = 0.36, 0.33, 0.31 for 0.05, 0.10 and 0.15 m water
depth on the performance of the system are investigated and optimized. depth, respectively [10].
The Semitransparent photovoltaic module is used in building industry
with the purpose of producing electricity and heating. Vats and Tiwari 3. Modeling of solar still integrated with ETC and SPVM
[8] measured the temperature of a building equipped with semitrans-
parent photovoltaic and opaque photovoltaic systems. Air duct is con- The energy balance equation for each component of the systems is
sidered to be installed in a façade or inclined. It is observed that there performed using the following assumptions;
are maximum (18.0 °C) and minimum (2.3 °C) rise in room air temper-
ature for semitransparent photovoltaic thermal (SPVT) roof without air (a) Solar distillation unit is vapor leakage proof.
duct and opaque photovoltaic thermal (OPVT) facade with air duct (b) Temperature dependent heat transfer coefficients have been
respectively. considered,
Nayak and Tiwari [9] measured theoretically and experimentally the (c) Side heat loss from the solar still is neglected,
temperature of greenhouse and PV module by installing a photovoltaic (d) There is no thermal stratification across the water depth,
module on the greenhouse roof. Results show that there is a good agree- (e) Initial values of water and condensing cover temperatures have
ment between the temperature calculated by the theoretical model and been used to determine the values of internal heat transfer coef-
that found in experimental analysis. Net annual electrical production is ficients,
reported 716 kWh. Also, annual output thermal exergy is calculated for (f) System operates in quasi-steady state regime during the day,
the PV module to be 12.8 kWh. The exergy efficiency is found to be 4% in (g) (j) Water level in the solar still basin is assumed to be constant,
the case of PV module. (h) Water temperature inside the ETC is assumed to be constant
Since there are so many regions where availability of both healthy along the tube,
water and electrical power is low, present work is an attempt to inves- (i) Heat capacities of semitransparent PV module and basin are
tigate producing distilled water and electrical power, simultaneously, negligible.
M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11 3

Fig. 1. a. Schematic diagram of a solar still integrated with ETC and semitransparent PV module. b. Schematic diagram of thermosyphon process in single tube.

ho ¼ 5:7 þ 3:8V ðt Þ ð3Þ


3.1. Semitransparent photovoltaic module
Internal heat transfer coefficient could be calculated using the
Considering the assumptions discussed above, energy balance for Dunkle equations [12]
the PV module could be written as follows;
h1w ¼ hcw þ hew þ hrw ð4Þ
Rg α c βc Is ðt ÞAc þ h1w Ab ðT sw −T c Þ ¼ ho Ac ðT c −T a Þ þ ηm Rg βc Is ðt ÞAc ð1Þ
 
ðP sw −P c ÞðT sw þ 273Þ 1=3
where αc, βc are design parameters of the PV module (αc = 0.9, βc = hcw ¼ 0:884 ðT sw −T c Þ þ 3
ð5Þ
268:9  10 −P sw
0.83), and ηm is the electrical efficiency of the PV module given as [11];

  P sw −P c
ηm ¼ ηr;m 1−βr;m ðT c −25Þ ð2Þ hew ¼ 0:016273  hcw  ð6Þ
T sw −T c

Fig. 2. a. Water and glass cover temperature for 0.05 m water depth for three different studies. b. Variation of heat transfer coefficient for 0.03 m water depth for two different studies.
4 M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11

Table 1
Values of module efficiency and temperature coefficient for different PV modules.

Type of PV Module efficiency, μr,m (%) Temperature coefficient, βr,m (%) Reference

HIT 17 0.33 Vats and Tiwari [16]


CIGS 8.2 0.45 Nann and Emery [17]
CdTe 6.9 0.20 Nann and Emery [17]
p-Si 11.60 0.40 Nann and Emery [17]
m-Si 13.5 0.40 Rüther et al. [18]
a-Si 6.3 0.26 Yamawaki et al. [19]

3.4. Water mass in the evacuated tubes


h i 1
hrw ¼ εeff  σ ðT sw þ 273Þ2 þ ðT c þ 273Þ2 ½T sw þ T c þ 246;
εeff The energy equation for the evacuated tube collector can be written
1 1 as follows;
¼ þ −1 ð7Þ
εg εw
dT cw
Qu collector ¼ M cw C cw _ cw ðT cw −T sw Þ
þ Nc mC ð12Þ
dt
3.2. Basin liner
where, Qu_collector is useful energy collected by the evacuated tubes. The
first and second terms in the right side of Eq. (12) are the terms related
The heat loss from the side wall of the solar still can be neglected be-
to the increase in evacuated tubes water temperature and output ener-
cause the small contact surface area is considered in the present system.
gy of the collector, respectively.
The energy balance for the basin liner could be written as [13];
_ are calculated by the following equations
Note that, Qu_collector and m
[14];
α 0b ð1−βc ÞRg Is ðt ÞAb ¼ hbw Ab ðT b −T sw Þ þ hba Ab ðT b −T a Þ ð8Þ
Qu collector ¼ Aa Ic ðt Þηin ð13Þ
 . −1
lb 1

hba ¼ þ ð9Þ
Kb 2:8 a0 ðT cw −T a Þ
ηin ¼ ηo − ð14Þ
Ic ðt Þ
Kw h i
cðGr Lc  PrÞ =n ;
1
hbw ¼ c ¼ 0:54 and n ¼ 4 ð10Þ "  1:2 #0:4084
Lc Nudt  Grdt L
_ ¼ 0:0478dt πμ
m cosθ ð15Þ
Pr dt

3.3. Water mass of the solar still Nudt  Grdt gβQ u collector dt 4
¼ ð16Þ
Pr μC cw ν 2 Nc At
Water inside the tubes becomes hot receiving the thermal energy
from the solar radiation. Consequently, hot water with low density
moves the top and it is replaced with basin water and as a result the Solving Eqs. (1) and (11) the temperature of the PV module and of
temperature of water in the basin is increased. The energy balance for the basin water could be found as;
the inside of solar still can be written as;
Rg α c βc Is ðt ÞAc þ h1w Ab T sw þ ho Ac T a −ηm Rg βc I s ðt ÞAc
Tc ¼ ð17Þ
h1w Ab þ ho Ac
_ cw ðT cw −T sw Þ þ
Nc mC α 0w ð1−βc ÞRg Ab Is ðt Þ þ hbw Ab ðT b −T sw Þ
dT sw
¼ h1w Ab ðT sw −T c Þ þ Msw C sw ð11Þ α 0b ð1−βc ÞRg I s ðt Þ þ hbw T sw þ hba T
dt Tb ¼ ð18Þ
hbw þ hba

Cw and other physical-thermal properties of water as a function of


water temperature are listed in Table 3. In order to find the basin water temperature (Tsw) and evacuated
tube collector temperature (Tcw), one can write the Eqs. (11) and (12)
in the following forms;
Table 2
Design parameters of evacuated solar still.
dT cw
þ a1 T cw þ b1 T sw ¼ g1 ðt Þ ð19Þ
Specification Dimension dt
Ab 1 m2
Ac 1.26 m2 where,
At 0.21 m2
dt 0.047 m
_ cw þ a0 At Nc
N c mC _
Nc m
η0 0.536 a1 ¼ ; b1 ¼ − ; g 1 ðt Þ
εg 0.9 M cw C cw 0
 Mcw
εw 0.9 N c At Ic ðt Þηo þ a T a c
Mcw 22.5 kg
¼ ð20Þ
Mcw C cw
lb 0.005 m
Kb 0.0351 W/m·K
Nc 10 and,
a′ 0.824 m2/W·K
l 1.5 m dT sw
Rg 0.95 þ a2 T cw þ b2 T sw ¼ g 2 ðt Þ ð21Þ
dt
M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11 5

Table 3
Thermo-physical properties of water.

Quantity Expression

Kinematic viscosity (m2/s) [20] ν ¼ ð0:5155þ0:0192T


1
þ 0:12Þ  10−6
Specific heat (J/kg K) [20] Cw = 4226–3.224T + 0.0575T2 − 0.0002656T3
Expansion factor (K−1) [20] β = (0.3 + 0.116T − 0.0004T2) × 10−4
Partial saturated vapor pressure at water temperature (N/m2) [10] Psw = exp[25.317 − 5144 / (Tsw + 273)]
Partial saturated vapor pressure at condensing cover temperature (N/m2) [10] Pc = exp[25.317 – 5144 / (Tc + 273)]
Thermal conductivity (W/m K) [20] K = 0.557 + 0.002198T − 0.00000578T2
Latent heat of vaporization of water (J/kg) [21] L = 2.506 × 106 − 2.369 × 103T + 0.2678T2 − 8.103 × 10−3T3 − 2.079 × 10−5T4
Dynamic viscosity (N s/m2) [22] μ = 4.2844 × 10−5 + (0.517(T + 64.993)2 − 91.296)−1

where, and,

_ cw _ cw þ ZAb  −   þ 
N c mC Nc mC 1 1−e−c t þ þ −
1−e−c t
a2 ¼ − ; b2 ¼ ; g 2 ðt Þ T cw ¼ þ −
½ λ g 1 ðt Þ þ λ λ g 2 ðt Þ −
Msw C sw Msw C sw λ −λ c− cþ
A ðα e Is ðt Þ þ ZT a Þ
þ
¼ b

ð22Þ  λ− g1 ðt Þ þ λþ λ− g 2 ðt Þ þ λþ λ− T sw0 ec t −ec t
Msw C sw
þ −
þ T cw0 λþ ec t −λ− ec t  ð32Þ
h1w ho Ac h b
Z¼ þ bw ba ð23Þ
h1w Ab þ ho Ac hbw þ hba
Having the known values of Tsw and Tcw, the basin temperature (Tb)

   and the PV module temperature (Tc) are calculated.
α e ¼ Rg α 0w ð1−βc Þ þ h1 Rg βc Ac α c −ηm þ h2 Rg α 0b ð1−βc Þ ð24Þ
3.5. Theoretical electrical power and distillate yield
h1w
h1 ¼ ð25Þ
h1w Ab þ ho Ac The instantaneous electrical power and thermal power of the PV
module are defined as;
hbw
h2 ¼ ð26Þ
hbw þ hba E_ el ¼ ηm Rg βc Ac Is ðt Þ ð33Þ

Assuming (a1 + λa2) = c; (b1 + λb2) = λ ⋅ c the following equation is Daily energy efficiency of PV module could be calculated using the
achieved. Solving Eq. (27) two values of λ (λ+ and λ−), and conse- following equation;
quently two values for c (c+ and c−) will be obtained.
N
_
Eel;n
a2 λ2 þ ða1 −b2 Þλ−b1 ¼ 0 ð27Þ Eel;daily ¼ ∑n¼1 ð34Þ
1000

Multiplying λ to Eq. (21) and summating the both sides of Eqs. (19) where N is the solution stage number during sunny hours.
and (21) following equation is obtained; With the known values of Tsw and Tc, one can easily calculate the
mass flow rate of distilled water in solar still as follows;
d

ðT cw þ λT sw Þect ¼ ½g 1 ðt Þ þ λg 2 ðt Þect ð28Þ


dt hew ðT sw −T c Þ
_y¼
m ð35Þ
L
Dividing time into very small intervals, Eq. (28) can be solved. As-
suming that g1(t) and g2(t) are kept constant and are equal to the values Now, using Eq. (36), the mass flow rate of daily distilled water is ob-
of the previous time intervals, the above-written equations lead to the tained as;
following relations;
S

_y
My ¼ ∑s¼1 m ð36Þ
λþ T sw þ T cw
  


ecþ t −1 þ
¼ λþ T sw0 þ T cw0 þ g 1 ðt Þ þ λþ g 2 ðt Þ þ
=ec t ð29Þ where S is the solution stage number of time intervals.
c
3.6. Energy and exergy efficiencies
and,
The output energy of the integrated solar still system is sum of the
ðλ− T sw þ T cw Þ thermal energy and electrical energy.
  c− t 
e −1 −
¼ ðλ− T sw0 þ T cw0 Þ þ ðg1 ðt Þ þ λ− g2 ðt ÞÞ =ec t ð30Þ
E_ out ¼ ηm Rg βc Ac Is ðt Þ þ Ab hew ðT sw −T c Þ
c −
ð37Þ

As a result, Tsw and Tcw are calculated as; Instantaneous energy efficiency of the integrated system can be ob-
tained as;
 þ   − 
1 1−e−c t
1−e−c t E_ out E_ out
T sw ¼ þ

− ½ þ
g1 ðt Þ þ λþ g 2 ðt Þ − −
ð31Þ ηis ¼ ¼ ð38Þ
λ −λ c c
þ −
− þ
E_ in Ac  Is ðt Þ þ Aa  I c ðt Þ
ðg 1 ðt Þ þ λ− g 2 ðt ÞÞ þ T sw0 λþ ec t −λ− ec t þ T cw0 ec t −ec t 
6 M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11

The output exergy of the system includes thermal and electrical data. However, the difference between the values in the middle section
parts that can be calculated as follows; of the curves is due to the force mode effect which is discussed above.

Overallexergyoutput ¼ Thermalexergy
þ Electricalexergy
overall output energy Ex _ thermal þ Ex
_ out ¼ Ex _ electrical 4. Results and discussion

The output thermal exergy and the electrical exergy of the system With the known experimental data of Is(t), Ic(t) and ambient tem-
are defined as; perature (given in Table 4) which is measured during a typical summer
day in 16 May 2008 New Delhi (India) [7], equations have been solved
 
_ thermal ¼ hew  Ab  ðT sw −T c Þ  1− T sw using MATLAB data processing program to determine the values of Tc,
Ex ð39Þ
Ta _ sw , and E_ el .
Tsw, Tcw, m
Fig. 3a shows the variation of basin water and HIT PV module tem-
_ electrical ¼ η  Ac  Iex
Ex ð40Þ peratures for several water depths of 0.03, 0.07 and 0.12 m for 30, 70
m
and 120 kg of basin water mass flow, respectively. For the early hours
where, of the day, as the PV module temperature is more than basin water tem-
" perature, the distillation does not happen and heat transfer is just occur-
    #
4 Ta 1 Ta 4 ring in the form of radiation. Increasing the depth of water, water
Iex ¼ Is ðt Þ  1− þ ð41Þ
3 Ts 3 Ts temperature decreases, so that the temperature difference increases
resulting in an increase of the radiation heat transfer. When water and
In Eq. (41), Ts is the solar radiation temperature equaling to the sun the PV module temperatures become equal, the distillation begins to
temperature (6000 K). Then, the electrical exergy is obtained as; happen and then the temperature of basin water decreases. In particu-
lar, for the lower basin depths this phenomenon happens earlier as
_ electrical ¼ 0:933  η  Ac  Is ðt Þ
Ex ð42Þ the temperature curve peaks (maximum temperatures) occur earlier.
m
During sunshine, at a specific hour, for a low basin depth (0.03 m) the
The exergy efficiency of the solar still is defined as the ratio of output temperatures of basin water and PV module are high (Tsw = 90.42,
exergy (distillate yield and electrical energy) to the input exergy (radi- Tc = 88.82 °C) whereas after the disconnection of tubes from the
ation exergy), and can be expressed as; basin by means of water flow protector, the trend becomes reverse so
that higher temperature will be obtained for the higher basin depths.
Exergyoutput Ex_ out Fig. 3b shows the variation of basin water and PV module tempera-
ε¼ ¼ ð43Þ tures for two types of the PV module. It is observed that, type of PV mod-
Exergyinput _ in
Ex
ule does not have great effect on the basin water and PV module
temperatures.
Input exergy is a summation of the exergy related to the PV module
The change in internal heat transfer coefficient for the basin depths
and evacuated tube collector.
of 0.03 m and 0.12 m during a day is shown in Fig. 4a. Once the distilla-
_ in;ov ¼ Ex
Ex _ in;mo þ Ex
_ in;ev ð44Þ tion begins, the sudden leap of evaporative heat transfer coefficient
from water to the PV module surface (hew) and total heat transfer coef-
"    4 # ficient from water to the PV module cover (h1w) occurs. The heat
_ in
Ex 4 Ta 1 Ta
¼ 1− þ ð45Þ
I in 3 Ts 3 Ts

_ in;ov ðt Þ ¼ 0:933½Is ðt Þ þ Ic ðt Þ
Ex ð46Þ Table 4
Data pf ambient temperature as well as solar radiation over the ETC and PV module mea-
sured in 16 May 2008.

Time Is(t) W/m2 Ic(t) W/m2 Ambient temperature °C


3.7. Validation of the thermal modeling
7 70 0 26.0
8 420 400 28.0
In order to validate the present model, theoretical data obtained by
9 340 310 30.0
Singh et al. [7] and experimental data reported by Shiv Kumar et al. 10 480 460 33.0
[15] are used. As the system studied by Singh et al. [7] and Shiv Kumar 11 610 560 35.0
et al. [15] are equipped with a glass instead of the PV module, our 12 600 550 37.0
model should be modified to meet their operating conditions. To do 13 580 540 37.0
14 480 420 38.0
so, the main equations (Eqs. (1), (8) and (11)) will be changed respec- 15 360 300 39.0
tively as follows (Eq. (12) remains without any changes); 16 140 100 38.0


17 80 30 37.0
α 0g Is ðt ÞAg þ h1w Ab T sw −T gi ¼ ho Ag T go −T a ð47Þ 18 0 0 36.0
19 0 0 36.0
20 0 0 35.0
α 0b Is ðt ÞAb ¼ hbw Ab ðT b −T sw Þ þ hba Ab ðT b −T a Þ ð48Þ 21 0 0 34.0
22 0 0 31.0
_ cw ðT cw −T sw Þ þ α 0w Ab Is ðt Þ þ hbw Ab ðT b −T sw Þ
Nc mC 23 0 0 30.0

dT sw 24 0 0 28.0
¼ h1w Ab T sw −T gi þ M sw C sw ð49Þ 1 0 0 27.5
dt
2 0 0 27.0
3 0 0 26.0
It should also be mentioned that the difference between the studied 4 0 0 25.6
system of Singh et al. [7] and that of Shiv Kumar et al. [15] was using the 5 0 0 25.0
force mode instead of natural mode in the work of Shiv Kumar et al. [15]. 6 0 0 26.0
Referring to Fig. 2, it can be seen that the trend obtained by our de- Initial water temperature = 25 °C.
veloped model is an almost the same compared to the experimental Initial SPVM temperature = 24 °C.
M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11 7

Fig. 3. a. Effect of water depth over water and PV module temperature. b. Effect of type of PV module on water and PV module temperatures.

transfer coefficients are maximized during specific hours due to the Fig. 6 shows the daily performance of the system under several com-
same justification presented in the results of Fig. 3a. binations of tubes number (10, 15, 20 and 25) and basin water depths.
Using the HIT PV module type and 10 tubes, the calculated instanta- For the specific number of tubes, the maximum of water yield in a day
neous water yields for several water basin depths are shown in Fig. 5a. It occurs for a basin depth of 0.07 m. Also, with an increase in the tube
is observed that after sunset and despite of expectation, there is not a re- numbers the water yield in a day increases. The water depth of 0.07 m
markable drop in the water yield rate due to the thermal storage capac- is the optimal choice because of two reasons: a) For lower water depths,
ity of water. This phenomenon is more pronounced for higher basin the temperature of water increases with higher slope and meets the PV
depths. Even an increase is observed for a basin depth of 0.12 m after module temperature earlier and consequently the distillation occurs
the sunset. The maximum of distillate yield rate is obtained earlier. b) For higher water depths, the system's potential to save
8.93 × 10−5 kg/s·m2 for water depth of 0.03 m at 16:00 and decreases water thermal energy increases, so that during sunset the possibility
with an increase in water depth (4.60 × 10−5 kg/s·m2 for 0.12 m depth to produce more distilled water increases. Therefore, water depth of
at 23:00). Fig. 5b shows that type of the PV module does not have pro- the basin has a mutual contrary effect, so that maybe the best option
nounced effect on the distillate yield rate. is using the average amount of water depth, as the results indicate.

Fig. 4. a. Variation of heat transfer coefficient for 0.03 m, 0.12 m water depth and HIT type PV module. b. Effect of PV type on heat transfer coefficient for 0.07 m of water depth.
8 M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11

Fig. 5. a. Variation of distillate yield rate with water depth for HIT module. b. Effect of type of PV module over distillate yield rate, 0.07 m depth.

Using 10 tubes the water production in a day is obtained 2.13 kg/ temperature so that they do not affect the electrical efficiency so
m2·day for a basin depth of 0.03 m. The amount of water during the much. Consequently, it can be concluded that tube number does not af-
day for the system proposed by Singh et al. [7] is calculated (3.8 kg/ fect the electrical efficiency as well. It is revealed that the electrical
m2·day). power increases by increasing the rate of solar radiation. The maximum
In fact, as discussed, the maximum water production in a day radiation measured 600 W/m2 and the maximum yield is obtained
(4.77 kg/m2·day) is achieved for the basin depth of 0.07 m and 30 70.47 W/m2 (both of them occurred at 12:00). It is revealed that the
tubes whereas in the model developed by Singh et al. [7] the maximum maximum electrical power and minimum electrical power are obtained
production is achieved 5.89 kg/m2·day. Therefore, it can be concluded using the HIT type and a-Si type respectively.
that using more tube numbers, the daily water production difference Daily electrical power yield during the day for all PV modules is
between using glass and PV module decreases. shown in Fig. 7b. The HIT module brings the highest value of daily
Fig. 7a shows the variation of the PV electrical power production yield (483.2 Wh/m2). It can be concluded that HIT type could be the
using different types of the PV module. The trends are due to two best alternative for the application.
main reasons, the change in the rate of solar radiation and the change Hourly energy and exergy outputs for several basin depths are
in module efficiency. As mentioned before, basin water depth and shown in Fig. 8. In the early hours of the day, the output energy and
basin water temperature have not significant effect on the PV module exergy are results of electrical energy production and they are increased

Fig. 6. The amount of distillate yield in a day for various combination of evacuated tube number and water depth for HIT PV module ((g) column is related to glass mode).
M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11 9

Fig. 7. a. Variation of electrical power six different PV modules and d = 0.07. b. Daily electrical energy for PV module.

by increasing the solar radiation. When the distillation begins the initial of energy efficiency. Daily energy and exergy efficiencies during the
peaks emerge and it should be noted that these values are more for day hours are shown in Fig. 10. Using 10 tubes in ETC (NC = 10), energy
lower depths. After the sunset, the energy and exergy outputs still and exergy efficiencies are maximized when the water depth is 0.07 m.
exist due to the thermal storage capacity of water. As it is expected, The values are 16.65% and 6.86%, respectively, and decrease to 15.45%
the energy and exergy outputs are more for higher depths. It could be and 6.84% for 0.03 m depth and 14.52%, and 6.64% for 0.12 m depth.
observed that after the sunset, the reduction in exergy output is more Therefore, 0.07 m seems to be the best alternative, it can be noticed
than the reduction in energy output considering relation ð1− TTswa Þ in that with an increase in the number of tubes of integrated ETC, the
Eq. (39). When the input solar energy is 7.8 kWh (≈exergy 7.2 kWh), daily energy and exergy efficiencies decrease due to the great amount
the total energy and exergy outputs are obtained 2.0 kWh and of thermal losses. Using 30 tubes in the system using the glass, energy
0.826 kWh, respectively (for a depth of 0.03 m and HIT PV module). and exergy efficiencies were reported 26.8% and 2.4% by Singh et al.
Hourly variation of the instantaneous energy efficiency during sun- [7] for water depth of 0.07 m whereas, in the present work, the efficien-
shine hours is evaluated and shown in Fig. 9a. During sunshine, overall cies are found 13.17% and 3.9%, respectively.
instant energy efficiency is low due to the time lag between radiation
and distillation which decreases output energy. Hourly energy efficien- 5. Conclusions
cy is maximum for the lowest water depth (0.03 m) due to the most dis-
tillate yield during sunshine. The sudden increase occurs because of two Thermal model for the solar still equipped with the evacuated tube
reasons, one is the beginning of the distillation and the other reason is collector in natural mode and semitransparent photovoltaic module
the reduction in solar radiation (see Eq. (43)). for aim of producing distilled water and electricity is developed. The
Fig. 9b depicts similar trends for instant exergy efficiency. The over- performance of the proposed system is analyzed considering the effect
all instant exergy efficiency of the system is in the range of 10–13% be- of various parameters on the system performance. Some main results
tween 7:00 and 16:00 and maximum (26.6%) at 17:00. The sharp of the present work could be summarized as follows;
increase also could be justified by the same reason claimed in the case
• As the water temperature of evacuated tube collector is more than the
temperature of the basin, by adding the thermal energy to the solar
still, the temperature of water basin rises and consequently, the distil-
late yield increases.
• The maximum of distillate yield rate is obtained 8.93 × 10−5 kg/s·m2
for a water depth of 0.03 m at 16:00 which decreases with an increase
in water depth (4.60 × 10−5 kg/s·m2 for 0.12 m depth at 23:00). Fig.
5b shows that type of PV module does not have pronounced effect on
the distillate yield rate.
• Using 10 tubes, the maximum distillate yield in a day is obtained
2.3 kg/m2·day for the depth of 0.07 m. This value increases with in-
creasing the tube numbers and reaches 4.76 kg/m2·day when using
30 tubes. Also, the results indicate that type of the PV module does
not have a remarkable effect on the distillate yield in a day.
• The produced electrical power depends on the PV module, solar radi-
ation and the temperature of PV module. The maximum electrical en-
ergy is achieved for the HIT type with value of 70.47 W/m2 that occurs
at maximum solar radiation time (12:00).
Fig. 8. Variation of energy and exergy output from integrated system. • Using 10 tubes and HIT as the PV module, the ranges of energy and
10 M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11

Fig. 9. a. Variation of instant energy efficiency during day with water depth for HIT PV module. b. Variation of instant exergy efficiency during day with water depth for HIT PV module.

exergy changes are found to be 0.006–0.228 kWh and 0.0001– Ab basin area of solar still (m2)
0.1006 kWh, respectively. Ac PV module area of solar still (m2)
• Using 10 tubes and HIT as the PV module, the changes in energy and At circumferential area of each tubular absorber (m2)
exergy efficiencies are obtained 9.5%–256.1% and 10%–41.8%, respec- Ccw specific heat capacity of the ETC water (J/kg K)
tively. The maximum energy and exergy efficiencies are found to be Csw specific heat capacity of the basin water (J/kg K)
16.65% and 6.86%, respectively. dt evacuated tube inner diameter (m)
• Results show that with an increase in the number of tubes of integrat- dt small time interval (s)
ed ETC, the daily energy and exergy efficiencies decrease due to higher E_ el electrical energy output of the integrated solar still (W)
amount of thermal losses. E_ el;daily daily electrical energy output of the integrated solar still (W/
day)
E_ out overall energy input in integrated solar still (W)
Nomenclature E_ in energy input in integrated solar still (W)
a′ solar collector efficiency coefficient (W/m2 K) Ex_ electrical electrical exergy output in integrated solar still (W)
Aa aperture area of solar collector (m2) Ex_ in exergy input in integrated solar still (W)
Ex_ in;mo exergy input in integrated solar still through PV module (W)

Fig. 10. Variation of daily energy and exergy efficiency for different combination of evacuated tube number and water depth for HIT PV module ((g) column is related to glass mode).
M. Yari et al. / Desalination 398 (2016) 1–11 11

_ in;ev
Ex exergy input in integrated solar still through evacuated tube ν kinematic viscosity of water (m2/s)
collector (W) σ Stefan Boltzmann constant (5.6697 × 10−8 W/m2 K4)
_ out
Ex exergy output in integrated solar still (W) ηo solar collector efficiency (–)
_ thermal
Ex thermal exergy output in integrated solar still (W) ηis instant energy efficiency of system
g gravitational acceleration (m2/s)
G Grashof number based on tube inner diameter (–)
HIT Heterojunction with Intrinsic Thin layer Subscripts
hba overall heat transfer coefficient from basin to ambient
through bottom (W/m2 K)
hbw convective heat transfer coefficient from basin liner to water
(W/m2 K) a ambient air
h1w total heat transfer coefficient from water to the PV module b basin
(W/m2 K) c solar cell
hcw convective heat transfer coefficient from water to the PV ov overall
module (W/m2 K) s solar still
hew evaporative heat transfer coefficient from water to the PV w water
module (W/m2 K)
ho convective-radiative heat transfer coefficient from PV module References
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