Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
Journal of Thermal Analysis and Calorimetry, 2026 (SCI-Expanded, Scopus)
Solar still (SS) technology offers a sustainable solution for freshwater production, especially in arid regions such as southern Tunisia with high solar irradiance. In the present paper, different SS designs were experimentally investigated to enhance their performance compared with a conventional solar still (CSS). The novelty of this work lies in the combined integration of a stepped basin design, an external reflector, and a fan-assisted airflow system to intensify evaporation and condensation processes under real arid climatic conditions. Five configurations with identical geometric dimensions were evaluated. The first one is a conventional solar still, while the others are modified configurations: a basic stepped solar still (BSSS), a fan-assisted solar still (FSSS), a reflector-assisted solar still (RSSS), and a hybrid configuration integrating both a fan and reflector (FRSSS). Experiments were conducted over four consecutive summer days under the arid climatic conditions of Gafsa City, southern Tunisia. Various performance parameters were evaluated including glass temperature, basin water temperature, solar irradiance, and cumulative freshwater yield. An improvement in productivity of 52%, 70%, 98%, and 128% was obtained for BSSS, FSSS, RSSS, and FRSSS, respectively, compared with the CSS. The FRSSS configuration achieved the highest thermal efficiency (62%), delivering a cumulative freshwater yield of 6.16 l day−1 m−2 compared with 2.66 l day−1 m−2 for the CSS. The water production cost decreased to approximately 0.013 USD l−1. Water quality analysis confirmed effective desalination, with total dissolved solids reduced from 1247 to 39 mg l−1. Moreover, the enhanced productivity contributes to lowering the environmental footprint per liter of produced water, supporting sustainable freshwater production in arid regions.