Desalination 292 (2012) 105112

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

Design, fabrication and performance analysis of an improved solar still

Amimul Ahsan a, e,, Monzur Imteaz b, Ataur Rahman c, Badronnisa Yusuf a, T. Fukuhara d
a

Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia Faculty of Engineering and Industrial Sciences, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn, Melbourne, VIC 3122, Australia c School of Engineering, University of Western Sydney, Penrith South, Sydney, NSW1797, Australia d Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering, University of Fukui, 3-9-1 Bunkyo, Fukui 910-8507, Japan e Green Engineering and Sustainable Technology Lab, Institute of Advanced Technology, University Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia
b

a r t i c l e

i n f o

a b s t r a c t
In this paper, a detail comparison of the design, fabrication, cost and water production analysis between an old Tubular Solar Still (TSS) and improved (new) one is presented. Since the cover material, a vinyl chloride sheet, of the old TSS was a little bit heavy, expensive and cannot be formed into a desirable size easily, a highly durable polythene lm was adopted as the cover of the new TSS. The new TSS is made of cheap and locally acquisitioned lightweight materials. Consequently, the weight and cost of the new TSS were noticeably reduced and the durability was distinctly increased. A few eld experiments on the new TSS were carried out in Fukui (Japan) and Muscat (Oman) and the observed results are compared with the old one. The water production ux is proportional to the temperature difference inside the still. Evaporation mass transfer coefcients (MTCs) and heat transfer coefcients (HTCs) are higher than those of condensation. Convection HTCs are much lower than those of evaporation/condensation. Finally, a linear relation is newly found between the total HTCs and MTCs. 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Article history: Received 20 December 2011 Received in revised form 11 February 2012 Accepted 13 February 2012 Available online 13 March 2012 Keywords: Design Cost Production Tubular Solar Still (TSS) Mass transfer coefcient Heat transfer coefcient

1. Introduction Solar stills of different designs have been investigated by many researchers, e.g. single-slope (Feilizadeh et al. [1]), double-slope basintype (Murugavel and Srithar [2]), weir-type cascade (Tabrizi et al. [3,4]), wick-type (Mahdi et al. [5]), inverted absorber solar still (Dev and Tiwari [6]), portable active solar still (Esfhani et al. [7]), integrated basin solar still with a sandy heat reservoir (Tabrizi and Sharak [8]) and tilted wick-type with at plate bottom reector (Tanaka [9]). The performance of solar still has been improved using a hybrid photovoltaic/thermal (PV/T) system by Kumar and Tiwari [10], Kumar et al. [11], Dev and Tiwari [12], Gude and Nirmalakhandan [13], using ash evaporation by El-Zahaby et al. [14], using a hybrid heat pump compression system by Hidouri et al. [15], using a shallow solar pond by El-Sebaii et al. [16] and using a reciprocating spray feeding system by El-Zahaby et al. [17]. The effects of cover tilt angle by Khalifa [18], insulation thickness by Khalifa and Hamood [19] and n by Velmurugan et al. [20] on the productivity of solar still have been investigated. Eldalil [21] presented a new concept of active vibratory solar still with an average daily

Corresponding author at: Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, (Green Engineering and Sustainable Technology Lab, Institute of Advanced Technology), University Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia. Tel.: +60 3 8946 4492; fax: +60 3 8656 7129. E-mail addresses: ashikcivil@yahoo.com, aahsan@eng.upm.edu.my (A. Ahsan). 0011-9164/$ see front matter 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.desal.2012.02.013

efciency of about 60%. Complicated system is generally costly and may require regular monitoring with skilled personnel, which makes a complicated system unsuitable for remote and coastal areas. An improved (new) Tubular Solar Still (TSS) was, therefore, designed to overcome those issues and to provide potable water for a few families or a small society in arid, remote and coastal areas. It can be installed near to a house for the purpose of reducing time and labor involved in carrying drinking water. An old TSS was designed using a vinyl chloride sheet as a cover material which was a little bit heavy, expensive and cannot be formed into a desirable size easily. In order to overcome these drawbacks, the new TSS was fabricated using cheap, durable and locally acquisitioned lightweight materials for practical use. Consequently, the weight and cost of the new TSS were noticeably reduced. These improvements also can help to assemble the new TSS easily in those areas. Many researchers have focused their research on conventional basin type stills rather than other types such as tubular still. Most of the numerical models of the solar still based on a convection heat transfer have been described using temperature and vapor pressure on the water surface and still cover, without noting the presence of intermediate medium, i.e. humid air (Velmurugan et al. [22], Shukla and Sorayan [23], Arunkumar et al. [24]). However, it has been found that the relative humidity of the humid air is denitely not saturated in the daytime from the laboratory and eld experiments conducted in Oman and Japan (Ahsan et al. [25], Ahsan and Fukuhara [26]). Therefore, the incorporation of the humid air properties in numerical modeling should be required to predict not only the evaporation but also the condensation.

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Cover-Vinyl chloride sheet

(0.52m long, 0.13m diameter & 0.5mm thickness)

Trough-Vinyl chloride sheet

(0.49m long, 0.10m diameter & 1.0mm thickness) A Evaporation
Water

Water

Lid Production (Distilled water) Collection vessel

Distilled water Cross Section at A-A

Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of old TSS.

In addition, a complete theoretical relation of evaporation and condensation mass or heat transfer inside a solar still has not been developed. In this paper, the details of the design, fabrication, cost and water production analysis of the old and new TSSs are presented. A relationship between the water production ux and the temperature difference inside the still is demonstrated. In addition, diurnal variations of evaporation, condensation and convection mass and heat transfer coefcients are obtained by considering humid air properties. Some new equations are proposed here to calculate these coefcients. Finally, a linear relation is newly observed between the total mass and heat transfer coefcients. 2. Design and structure 2.1. Basin-type solar still A basin-type solar still is the most common among conventional solar stills (Dev et al. [27], Setoodeh et al. [28]). The cover of the basin-type solar still is usually made of heavy glass and cannot be made easily in remote and coastal village areas. The price of glass is expensive as well. Details of the eld observations carried out in Ras Al Khaimah (UAE) on basin-type solar still were presented by Fukuhara et al. [29]. 2.2. Old TSS The old TSS was designed by Islam et al. [30] and a series of eld water production experiments were carried out in Hamuraniyah agricultural rm, Ras Al Khaimah (UAE) and in Fukui (Japan). The old TSS is comprised with a tubular cover, a transparent polyvinyl chloride lid at both ends of the cover and with a semicircular black trough inside it as shown in Fig. 1. The attached lid at the end of the tubular cover can be opened and the trough can be promptly taken out and easily

inserted back after ushing accumulated salt. The inclination of the support under the old TSS is required to collect the produced water from the lower edge of the still.

2.3. New TSS In this study, the new TSS was designed to improve the limitations of the old one. The new TSS is consisted of a frame, a tubular cover and a rectangular trough shown in Fig. 2. The frame was assembled with two galvanized iron (GI) pipes and a GI wire arranged in the longitudinal and transverse (in spiral shape) directions, respectively. These two GI pipes also provide support to the trough. The GI pipe was 0.52 m in length and 6 mm in diameter. The GI wire was 1.2 mm in diameter. The frame can restrain the deformation of the tubular cover. The new TSS was designed in such a way that the inclination of the support is not required to collect the produced water.

3. Pure water production mechanism The principle of pure water production from saline water using different designs of a solar water distillation technique is the same. The mechanism of the new TSS is illustrated in Fig. 3 [26]. The solar radiant heat after transmitting through the cover is mostly absorbed by the saline water in the trough. The rest is absorbed by the cover and the trough. Thus, the saline water is heated up and evaporates. The water vapor density of the humid air increases due to evaporation from the water surface. The water vapor is condensed then on the inner surface of the cover, releasing its latent heat due to evaporation. Finally, the condensed water naturally trickles down toward the bottom of the cover due to gravity and is stored in a collector.

Cover-Polythene film
(0.52m long, 0.13m diameter & 0.15mm thickness)

Trough-Carton paper
(0.49m long, 0.10m width & 3.0mm thickness) A Evaporation Water Water A

Production (Distilled water) Collector

Spiral wire Metallic pipe

Distilled water Cross section at A-A

Fig. 2. Schematic diagram of new TSS.

A. Ahsan et al. / Desalination 292 (2012) 105112 Table 2 Materials of cover and trough for old TSS and new one. Items Cover material Thickness of cover (mm) Transmissibility (%) Density (kg/m3) Trough Trough material Trough wrapped by Thickness of trough (mm) Cover Old TSS Vinyl chloride sheet 0.50 80 1470 Vinyl chloride 1.0 New TSS

107

Polythene lm-Diastara 0.15 89 964 Carton paper Black polythene lm 3.0

Fig. 3. Potable water production principle in new TSS.

a Diastar is the commercial name of the Agricultural Polyolen Durable Film marketed by MKV Platech Co. Ltd., Japan with a ve year warranty. In Japan, Diastar is used to make a greenhouse to protect plants from the very cold weather and heavy snowfall.

4. Overview of old and new TSSs 4.1. Specication of TSSs The overview of specications of the old TSS and new one are summarized in Table 1. The tubular cover was 0.52 m in length and with an outside diameter of 0.13 m. The trough was 0.1 m in outside diameter/width and 0.49 m in length. The new TSS was designed with the same specications as of the old one. 4.2. Cover and trough materials Table 2 shows the materials of cover and trough for the old TSS and the new one. In the old TSS, the tubular cover was made of a curled transparent vinyl chloride sheet of 0.5 mm in thickness and a polyvinyl chloride lid at both ends. The transmissibility of the vinyl chloride sheet was about 80%. The vinyl chloride sheet was replaced with a highly durable polythene lm (called Diastar) as a cheap material for the cover of the new TSS. The thickness and transmissibility of the Diastar were 0.15 mm and 89%, respectively. The trough was made of a vinyl chloride with 1.0 mm in thickness and of a carton paper with 3.0 mm in thickness for the old TSS and the new one, respectively. The carton paper was then wrapped by a black polythene lm of 0.05 mm in thickness to make it waterproof for the new TSS. Fig. 4 shows the photographs of parts of the old TSS. 4.3. Weight and durability Table 3 presents the weight and durability comparison of the old TSS with new one. The weight calculation was performed for the same specications of both the TSSs shown in Table 1. The weight of the new TSS was reduced by 61% of the old one. Consequently, the new TSS is very convenient for carrying and assembling due to light weight. The overall life of both the cover and trough of the old TSS is about 2 years from our eld experiences. Whereas, the cover (Diastar) of the new TSS is guaranteed for 5 years and the life of the frame is also about 5 years, while the life of trough is about 1 year.

To increase the durability and lifespan of the trough of new TSS, the carton paper could be replaced with Perspex (Plexiglas). 5. Fabrication and water production cost 5.1. Fabrication cost Table 4 summarizes the comparison of the fabrication cost between the old TSS and new one. The fabrication cost of a new TSS is as cheap as 252 Yen (), which is about 7% of that of the old TSS. In Japan, materials are generally expensive. Therefore, it is expected that the fabrication cost will be reduced by at least one-third in developing countries, e.g. India, Nigeria and Bangladesh. 5.2. Fresh water production cost The most important factor is the cost of fresh water production for commercialization of the new TSS. Table 5 presents the cost of fresh water production using the old TSS and new one. The cost of fresh water production using the new TSS is about 956/m 3, which is about 5% of that of the old TSS. Table 6 shows the cost comparison of fresh water production of the desalination technologies with the solar water distillation. The reverse osmosis is the most popular and the cheapest technique among the desalination technologies. In fact, it is not relevant to compare the cost of solar water distillation with the conventional desalination technologies due to the difference in application purpose. The conventional desalination technologies are suitable to produce massive pure water daily in a city and the cost of initial installment, operation and maintenance is very high. A small rural community might not be able to install these techniques due to the limitations of resources and energy. The solar water distillation is, therefore, more appropriate in such cases. The cost of fresh water production using the new TSS is affordable and about one-third cheaper than the basin-type solar still. The new TSS was made manually one at a time. Therefore, the fabrication cost (consequently, the cost of water production) can be easily reduced by making a large number of TSSs together. 5.3. Cost analysis The cost analyses for various designs of solar still are shown in Table 7 to compare with the old and new TSSs. The payback period may depend on the fabrication cost, maintenance cost, operating cost, cost of minerals and cost of feed water. Since the purpose is to compare the water production cost and payback period with some previous designs, therefore, the maintenance cost ($0.1/day), the mineral water cost ($0.2/kg) and the cost of minerals ($0.03/5 kg of produced water) are supposed to the same as Velmurugan et al. [22]. Thus the cost of produced water per day is 100 = $1. The estimated fabrication cost of the new TSS is about 872 (=2 436 =

Table 1 Overview of specications of old TSS and new one. Items Cover Old TSS Shape of cover Length of cover (m) Diameter of cover (m) Shape of trough Length of trough (m) Diameter/width of trough (m) Frame of TSS Assemble and setup of TSS Inclination of TSS New TSS Tubular 0.52 0.13 Semicircular 0.49 0.10 Relatively hard Necessary Tubular 0.52 0.13 Rectangular 0.49 0.10 GI pipe and wire Easy Not necessary

Trough

TSS

Note: GI = Galvanized iron.

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A. Ahsan et al. / Desalination 292 (2012) 105112

Semicircular

Trough made of vinyl chloride

Tubular cover made by vinyl chloride sheet

Tubular cover with trough

Complete TSS

Fig. 4. Photographs of parts of old TSS.

$8.72) with the water production capacity of 5 kg/day. The cost of feed water is neglected. Net earning per day = Cost of water produced maintenance cost (including cost of minerals) = (100 13) = 87 ($0.87) Payback time = Fabrication cost/ Net earning per day= (872/87) = 0.03 year.

8. Evaporation, condensation and convection heat transfer The evaporation heat transfer coefcient (HTC), Hew (W/m 2.K), can be dened as H ew Lv we =T w T c Lv Mew vw vc =T w T c 3

6. Major advantages of new TSS The major advantages of the new TSS include affordable fabrication cost, cost reduced to one-twentieth, weight reduced to nearly one-third, fabrication materials of the new TSS (polythene, carton paper) are easily available in underdeveloped and developing countries, inclination of the support is not required, can be assembled easily on-site without using any special tools, and easy maintenance and repair. Some common advantages of both the old and new TSSs include utilization of renewable (solar) energy, i.e. electric power is not required at all, environmentally and ecologically favorable approach, i.e. zero CO2 emissions, satisfactory daily fresh water production (5 kg/m 2.day), thermal insulation material is not required for the trough, a minimum land usage, and shorter water transportation distance. 7. Evaporation and condensation mass transfer The evaporation mass transfer coefcient (MTC), Mew (m/s), can be expressed as Mew we =vw vc 1

where, Lv is the latent heat of vaporization (J/kg). Similarly, the condensation HTC, Hcdha (W/m 2.K), can be expressed in the form H cdha Lv wc =T ha T c Lv Mcdha vha vc =T ha T c 4

The convective HTC from the water surface, Hcw (W/m 2.K), can be dened by the form of enthalpy, i.e. H cw ue a C pa we a C pa =vw 5

where, ue is the vertical component of the air velocity on the water surface (m/s), a is the density of air (kg/m 3) and Cpa is the specic heat of air (J/kg.K). It is assumed that ue is equal to the evaporation velocity (we/vw). Then, it can be transformed using Eq. (1) as H cw M ew vw vc a C pa =vw 6

Table 4 Fabrication cost comparison of old TSS with new one. Items Vinyl chloride sheet (0.5 mm thickness) Spiral plastic support (of cover) Polyvinyl chloride lid (at both ends of TSS) Vinyl chloride for trough (1 mm thickness) Silicon glue (330 ml) Water pipe (1 cm diameter) Miscellaneous Total cost New TSS Polythene lm (0.15 mm thickness) Carton paper Black polythene lm for trough Metallic pipe for frame (6 mm diameter) Metallic wire for frame (1.2 mm diameter) G17 glue Scotch tape Miscellaneous Total cost Old TSS Quantity Unit cost 0.27 m2 2 p. 2 p. 0.49 m 1 tube 0.5 m 0.34 m2 1 p. 2 p. 4m 25 ml 4m 5678 /m2 105 /p. 248 /p. 1006 /m 597 /tube 348 /m 185 /m2 0 98 /10 p. 105 /4 p. 300 /50 m 488 / 170 ml 128 /50 m Cost ()a 1533 210 496 493 597 174 50 3553 63 0 10 53 24 72 10 20 252

where, we is the evaporation mass ux (kg/m 2.s). Similarly, the condensation MTC, Mcdha (m/s), can be denoted as Mcdha wc =vha vc where, wc is the condensation mass ux (kg/m 2.s).
Table 3 Weight and durability comparison of old TSS with new one. Items Weight Cover of TSS (kg) Trough of TSS (kg) Frame of TSS (kg) Total weight of TSS (kg) Cover of TSS (year) Trough of TSS (year) Frame of TSS (year) Old TSS 0.454 0.381 0.835 2 2 New TSS 0.051 0.131 0.142 0.324 5 1 5

Durability

a 1 US$ 100 . Most of the price taken from Mitsua Supermarket, Fukui, Japan. The labor cost is not included in the estimation. p: piece.

A. Ahsan et al. / Desalination 292 (2012) 105112 Table 5 Water production cost using old TSS and new one. Items Unit cost of a TSS () Average life of a TSS (yr) Annual cost of a TSS (/yr) Daily production (kg/day) Annual production (kg/yr) Cost of fresh water (/m3) Calculation A B C = A/B D E = D 365 F = C 1000/E Old TSS 3553 2 1776.5 0.25 91.25 19469 New TSS 436a 5 87.2 0.25 91.25 956 Table 7 Cost analyses for various designs of solar still. Solar stills Production (kg/m2.day) 0.83 1.27 1.37 1.40 1.65 Produced water cost ($) 0.19 0.30 0.32 0.33 0.39 Net earning ($/day) 0.07 0.17 0.19 0.20 0.26

109

Payback time (yrs) 7.07 3 2.64 2.55 1.99

a The average life of the new TSS is taken about 5 years. Therefore, the additional cost to fabricate 4 more troughs (because the life of trough is about a year) is included in the unit cost of the new TSS [252 + 4(10 + 36) = 436 ]. 1 m3 = 1000 kg. 1 US $ 100 .

Similarly, the convective HTC from the humid air, Hcha (W/m .K), can be formed as H cha uc a C pa wc a C pa =vha 7

Conventional solar stilla Integrating with na Integrating with n and adding pebble in basina Integrating with n and adding sponge in basina Integrating with n, and adding pebble and sponge in basina Old TSS New TSS
a

5 5

1 1

0.87 0.87

0.23 0.03

Velmurugan et al. [22].

where, uc is the normal component of the air velocity on the inner surface of the tubular cover (m/s) and it is supposed that uc is equal to the condensation velocity (wc/vha). Then, it can be rewritten using Eq. (2) in the form H cha Mcdha vha vc a C pa =vha 8

humidity of the humid air was remarkably below 100% in the daytime (minimum 50%), i.e. the humid air was denitely not saturated during the day time, but was nearly 100% saturated during the night. The daily water production capacity of the old and new TSSs is almost the same (5 kg/m 2.day). 9.2. Relationship between temperature difference and water production Fig. 7 shows a relationship between P and Tw Tc for the old TSS [33] and the new one using the eld observation results obtained in Fukui, Ras Al Khaimah and Muscat. It is found that the values of P are proportional to Tw Tc for the old and new TSSs. It implies that Tw Tc is one of the key parameters which affects P of a solar still. The regression can be expressed by Eq. (9) and this would be valid for the range of 0 Tw Tc 17 C. P 0:052 T w T c 9

9. Field observations Two typical one-day observation data in Fukui (Japan) on September 29, 2005 and Ras Al Khaimah (UAE) on September 14, 2002 are quoted here to show the observed temperature and water production proles of the old TSS [33]. Further two typical one-day observation data of the new TSS, from Fukui (Japan) on July 5, 2008 and from Muscat (Oman) on July 13, 2008 are also presented here. 9.1. Observed temperatures and water production

10. Coefcients of mass and heat transfer Fig. 5 (a) and (b) show the observed diurnal variations of the temperatures of water (Tw), and cover (Tc), and the observed water production ux (P) of the old TSS obtained in Fukui (Japan) and in Ras Al Khaimah (UAE), respectively. It is observed that although the values of both Tw and Tc are higher in Ras Al Khaimah than that of in Fukui, the daily water production amount is, however, almost the same for these two cities. Fig. 6 (a) and (b) show the observed diurnal variations of Tw, Tc and P of the new TSS obtained in Fukui (Japan) and Muscat (Oman), respectively. It is found that the values of P obtained in Muscat and Fukui are approximately the same, which could be the result of approximately the same temperature difference (Tw-Tc). In all the above-mentioned locations, Tw, Tc and P rose rapidly after sunrise (approximately 6:00) and peaked between 12:00 and 13:00 before declining gradually. In addition, the value of the relative 10.1. Diurnal variations of MTC and HTC Fig. 8 (a) and (b) show the diurnal variations of the evaporation and condensation MTCs obtained in Japan and Oman, respectively. A relation of Mew > Mcdha is observed, and found a peak value for each MTC at about 13:00 for both locations. Fig. 9 (a) and (b) show the diurnal variations of the evaporation, condensation and convection HTCs obtained in Japan and Oman, respectively. The values of HTCs are in order of Hew > Hcdha > Hcw > Hcha, however, the evaporation and condensation HTCs (Hew and Hcdha) are much higher than the convection HTCs (Hcw and Hcha). Note that the values of Mew, Mcdha, Hew, Hcdha, Hcw and Hcha are calculated using Eqs. (1), (2), (3), (4), (6) and (8), respectively and it is supposed that the evaporation/ condensation rate is equal to the production rate to simplify the analysis. 10.2. Relationship between total MTC and total HTC Fig. 10 presents a relationship between the total HTC (Ht) and the total MTC (Mt) using the eld observation results obtained in Japan and Oman. Here, Ht (W/m 2.K) indicates the sum of four HTCs and Mt (m/s) implies the sum of two MTCs. A linear relation is found between them and the regression line can be expressed as

Table 6 Cost comparison of fresh water production of desalination technologies with solar water distillation. Desalination technologies Multi-stage asha Multi-effect distillationa Vapor compressiona Reverse osmosisa Basin-type solar still (single-sloped) New TSS 1 m3 = 1000 kg. 1 US$ 100 . a Younos [31]. b Foster et al. [32]. Water production cost (/m ) 110150 4685 8792 4592 3000 956
3

H t 9:798 10 Mt

10

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A. Ahsan et al. / Desalination 292 (2012) 105112

Water surface, Tw 80

Tubular cover, Tc 2.0 80

Production flux 2.0 1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 24

Production flux (kg/m2.hr)

60 40 20 0 0 6 12 18

1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 24

60 40 20 0 0 6 12 18

Time of day (h)

Time of day (h)

a) September 29, 2005 in Fukui, Japan

b) September 14, 2002 in Ras Al Khaimah, UAE

Fig. 5. Diurnal variations of temperatures of water and cover, and observed water production ux of old TSS.

Water surface, Tw 80

Tubular cover, Tc 2.0 80

Production flux 2.0 1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0

Production flux (kg/m2.hr)

Temperature (oC)

40 20 0

Temperature (oC)

60

1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 24

60 40 20 0

12

18

12

18

24

Time of day (h)

Time of day (h)

a) July 5, 2008 in Fukui, Japan

b) July 13, 2008 in Muscat, Oman

Fig. 6. Diurnal variations of temperatures of water and cover, and observed water production ux of new TSS.

11. Conclusions This paper describes the details of the design, fabrication, cost and water production analysis of the old Tubular Solar Still (TSS) and the improved (new) one. The new TSS was made of cheap, durable, lightweight and locally available materials. The fabrication cost and weight

New TSS
Japan (2008) Oman (2008)

Old TSS
Japan (2005) UAE (2002)

1.5

of the new TSS were reduced by 92% and 61% of the old one, respectively. The water production ux was proportional to the temperature difference (Tw Tc), which is one of the key parameters that affects the daily production. The evaporation mass and heat transfer coefcients were higher than those of condensation. The average cumulative evaporation and condensation mass transfer coefcients (of Japan and Oman) were about 0.045 m/s and 0.03 m/s, respectively. The average cumulative condensation heat transfer coefcient (of Japan and Oman) was about 305 W/m 2.K, which was 77% of that of evaporation. The convection heat transfer coefcients were much lower than those of evaporation/condensation and only about 4% of those of evaporation. Finally, a linear relation was newly found between the total heat and mass transfer coefcients. Nomenclature Cpa Specic heat of air (J/kg.K) Hcdha Condensation HTC (W/m 2.K) Hcha Convective HTC from the humid air (W/m 2.K) Hcw Convective HTC from the water surface (W/m 2.K) Hew Evaporation HTC (W/m 2.K) Ht Total HTC (W/m 2.K) Lv Latent heat of vaporization (J/kg) Mcdha Condensation MTC (m/s) Mew Evaporation MTC (m/s) Mt Total MTC (m/s) P Hourly production mass ux (kg/m 2.h) Tc Cover temperature (C) Tha Humid air temperature (C) Tw Water surface temperature (C)

Hourly production flux, P (kg/m2.hr)

R2= 0.628 1.2 0.9 0.6 0.3 0 P = 0.052(Tw-Tc)

12

15

18

Temperature difference, Tw-Tc (C)

Fig. 7. Relationship between hourly production ux (P) and temperature difference (Tw Tc) for old and new TSSs (size of sample = 60).

Production flux (kg/m2.hr)

Production flux (kg/m2.hr)

Temperature (oC)

Temperature (oC)

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111

a) July 5, 2008 in Fukui, Japan

0.006 0.006

b) July 13, 2008 in Muscat, Oman

Evaporation MTC, Mew (m/s) Condensation MTC, Mcdha (m/s)

Evaporation MTC, Mew (m/s) Condensation MTC, Mcdha (m/s)

0.004

0.004

0.002

Mew Mcdha

0.002

Mew Mcdha

12

15

18

12

15

18

Time of day (h)

Time of day (h)

Fig. 8. Diurnal variations of evaporation and condensation mass transfer coefcients for new TSS.

a) July 5, 2008 in Fukui, Japan

70 5 70

b) July 13, 2008 in Muscat, Oman

5 4 3 2 1 10 0 6 9 12 15 18 0

HTCs, Hew and Hcdha (W/m2.K)

HTCs, Hcw and Hcha (W/m2.K)

60 50 40 30 20

60 50 40 30 20

4 3 2 1

10 0 6 9 12 15 18 0

Time of day (h)

Time of day (h)

Fig. 9. Diurnal variations of evaporation, condensation and convection heat transfer coefcients for new TSS.

uc ue wc we a vc

Normal component of the air velocity on tubular cover inner surface (m/s) Vertical component of the air velocity on the water surface (m/s) Condensation mass ux (kg/m 2.s) Evaporation mass ux (kg/m 2.s) Density of air (kg/m 3) Density of saturated water vapor on tubular cover inner surface at Tc (kg/m 3)

vha vw

Density of water vapor in humid air at Tha (kg/m 3) Density of saturated water vapor on water surface at Tw (kg/m 3)

Acknowledgements Authors gratefully acknowledge Dr. Shaul Islam, Dr. Saiful Islam, Dr. S.M. Moniruzzaman, Engr. Keiichi Waki, Dr. Hiroaki Terasaki, Dr. Akihiro Fujimoto, Dr. Yasuo Kita and Engr. Fumio Asano for their kind cooperation during staying in Fukui, Japan and for their continued friendly support. Special thanks and gratefulness to Dr. Rashid Al Maamari, Dr. Kazuo Okamura and Mr. Mark Sueyoshi for their kind cooperation during staying in Muscat, Oman. The partial nancial support provided by the Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture of Japanese Government, Japan, Shimizu Corporation, Japan and the Japan Cooperation Center, Petroleum (JCCP), Japan is also acknowledged.

120

Total HTC, Ht (W/m2.K)

100 80 60 40 20 0

R2= 0.884 Ht = 9.798103 Mt

Japan (2008) Oman (2008)

References
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0.002

0.004

0.006

0.008

0.01

0.012

Total MTC, Mt (m/s)

Fig. 10. Relationship between total HTC (Ht) and total MTC (Mt) for new TSS.

HTCs, Hcw and Hcha (W/m2.K)

Hew Hcdha Hcw Hcha

HTCs, Hew and Hcdha (W/m2.K)

Hew Hcdha Hcw Hcha

112

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