High Efficiency Solar Desalination and Superheated Steam Generation Utilizing Contactless Infrared Heating

The present study has investigated a novel configuration of a Contactless Solar Evaporation Structure (CSES), which has been prototyped over 41 experiments and 4 design iterations. The final design is able to utilize ~20% of solar energy (under 1 sun) to radiatively boil water for purposes of desalination (i.e. clean drinking water). The device can further reach boiling temperatures (water at 100 °C) as well as superheat steam to ~ 115 °C using a ~120 °C solar absorber as heat exchanger. A transient numerical model was developed and matched to the experimental results. This model was parameterized to predict trends of the device configuration to any scale, material, or solar irradiance. Secondary results include optical properties of key components of the solar still, design evolution over 41 experiments, innovation details for small-scale solar desalination devices, evaporation rates for 6 conventional solar still configurations, and a novel solar flux mapping procedure.