Performance Experimental Study on Stepped Type Basin Solar Still to Produce Salt and Fresh Water

Abstract

This paper presents an experimental performance study of a stepped type solar still for processing seawater into salt and fresh water. Its performance was tested in Padang City, under Indonesian environmental conditions. The experimental setup this study consisted of a tank of seawater, solar distillation and distilled water storage tanks. The working principle is the distillation of sea water put into the basin to be heated with solar power. The water will evaporate and condense on the surface of the cover glass distillation, distillation of fresh water stored in the container. Warming in the distillation carried out continuously until the water evaporates and the depleted salt crystals formed in the basin. The result shows that the productivity of the solar still was highly affected by the increase in solar radiation and ambient temperature. The productivity was 176 gr salt and 3,662 ml water with the average solar intensity 566 W/m2. The time it takes to produce salt is fourdays.