Effect of shape of condensing cover on energy and exergy analysis of a PVT-CPC active solar distillation system

In this work, an analytical expressions of various temperatures namely, water and condensing cover temperatures, yield and electrical power output of PVT-CPC active solar distillation system have been derived. These expressions depend on basic energy balance equations of the proposed system. Effect of inclination of condensing cover (θ), packing factor (β_c) and mass flow rate (ṁ_f) on hourly yield have been studied in brief in terms of overall thermal energy and exergy. The present thermal model for passive conical solar still has also been validated with the experimental results of Gad et al. (2015) for a given design parameters. Special cases of the proposed system have also been carried out. It has been found that the yield increases with an increase in inclination of conical shape of condensing cover for a given mass flow rate due to an increase in heat losses from condensing cover to the ambient air. Further, the yield also increases with the decrease in packing factor for a given mass flow rate as per our expectation.