Yield augmentation by integrating jute wick in a single slope solar still: an experimental study

The availability of freshwater is a significant challenge in today's world, especially in arid and coastal regions. As a solu-tion, purifying existing open water reservoirs or saline water could help bridge the gap between demand and supply. Solar distillation presents a promising method, requiring low initial investment and leaving no harmful environmental impact. However, limited yield due to the traditional design of a solar system is still a problem. Therefore, in the present study, the traditional design of the solar still, i.e. single slope solar still or conventional solar still (CSS) is modified with jute wick (MSS) at an inclination angle of 30º. The length-to-width ratio was kept at 3:1 to avoid shadows at the corners. The studies were conducted to assess how jute fibre as a wick, wind speed and solar intensity affected the CSS’s distillate production. The total yield was found to be 2.69 and 3.208 kg/m2 per day for CSS and MSS, respectively. Additionally, daily thermal efficiency was analysed to check the feasibility and practicability of the systems. It was evident that incorporating jute wick improves the thermal efficiency of CSS by 26.6%. These findings recommend MSS as a promising and economically viable solution for enhancing solar still performance.