Investigation on evacuated tubes coupled solar still with condenser and fins: Experimental, exergo-economic and exergo-environment analysis

The present experimental work was done to check the performance enhancement in distillate productivity between CSS and MSS in climatic conditions of Gandhinagar, Gujarat, India (23.21° N, 72.63° E). In modified solar still (MSS) fins, evacuated tubes and newly designed zig-zag shape air-cooled condenser were attached. An MSS was prepared to achieve the higher temperature in water inside the basin and maintain a lower temperature of glass cover than CSS. The highest obtained water temperature and temperature of inner glass cover for CSS and MSS were 63.75 °C & 69.21 °C and 54.37 °C & 54.93 °C separately. Modified solar still gives around 6 °C higher water temperature by maintaining the same inner glass cover temperature as CSS. The maximum distillate output for CSS and MSS was 2.26 kg/m2 and 3.92 kg/m2, respectively. It gives 73.45% of higher productivity than CSS. In a thermal analysis of a system, higher fractional exergy evaporation could be achieved for MSS. Also, in the still with different modifications, higher thermal efficiency was obtained. In cost analysis, the water achieved for CSS and MSS were 0.013 and 0.015 USD/L, respectively. Exergo-economic and exergo-environmental analysis for MSS shows that the modified system was highly beneficial from economic point of view and generation of less carbon value by CO2 mitigation.Kishor Kumar Sadasivuni: Supervision, Project administration, Acquisition of the financial support for the project leading to this publication.Scopu

Experimental diagnosis of inter-turns stator fault and unbalanced voltage supply in induction motor using MCSA and DWER

This paper presents a comparative study between two techniques of signal processing to diagnose both faults the inter-turn short circuit (ITSC) in stator windings and the unbalanced voltage supply (UVS) in induction motors. The first is considered a classical technique called Motor Current Signature Analysis (MCSA) which is based on the processing of the stator current by the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT). The second is anadvanced technique based on a Discrete Wavelet Energy Ratio (DWER) of three stator currents. The aim objective of this paper is to compare the ability and effectiveness of both techniques to detect the ITSC fault and the UVS in induction motors, and distinguishing between them. An experimental implementation tests the two diagnosis techniques.The results obtained show that the MCAS technique by the FFT analysis has a difficult to discriminate between the current harmonics due to the provide voltage unbalance and those originated by ITSC faults. Unlike the DWERtechnique, which has high sensitivity and exceptional ability to detect and distinguish between the two faults that lead to the reliability of the diagnosis system. To demonstrate that the DWER is an accurate and robust diagnosis approach are used the neural network (NN) as a tool to classify the faults (ITSC and USV) where using DWER indicators as NN input. The results obtained of combination between the DWER and NN are effective and proved its ability to detect both faults under different load conditions and distinguish between them accurately with low error (10-5)

An experimental investigation of emission performance of heterogenous catalyst jatropha biodiesel using RSM

Tremendous growth in the number of automobiles in developed and developing global economies has exorbitantly boosted competition for petroleum products. Petroleum products derived from fossil fuels are predominantly responsible for environmental pollution as unburnt hydrocarbon (HC), carbon monoxide (CO), oxides of nitrogen (NOx) & carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are released from the fossil fuel combustion. In the view of increasing environmental pollution and stringent emission norms, the present study is concentrated on using Jatropha biodiesel as an alternate fuel source to run variable compression ratio (VCR) diesel engine. The characteristics of VCR diesel engine emission have been evaluated under different compression ratio (CR), operating conditions of load & pressure of fuel injection. In this research work, Jatropha biodiesel diesel blend B30 (30% biodiesel and 70% diesel) and B0 (100% diesel) have been taken as fuel to run the engine. For conducting experiments, load has been varied from 0 to 12 Kg, CR from 14 to 18 and FIP from 180 to 270 bar as per the model of Response Surface Methodology experiments. The experimental investigation showed that the use of the B30 blend reduces HC & CO emissions by about 16.7% and 24% correspondingly in comparison to diesel. However noteworthy rise in NOx & CO2 emissions rate recorded by using the B30 blend as that of diesel. It has been shown that with enhancing in load & CR, HC emissions decreased significantly however increase in CO2 and NOx observed. Advancing FIP, significantly decreases HC & CO emissions as well as tends to increase NOx and CO2 emissions.Scopu

Productivity forecasting of solar distiller integrated with evacuated tubes and external condenser using artificial intelligence model and moth-flame optimizer

This paper aims at developing an artificial intelligence model to forecast the water yield of a modified solar distiller integrated with evacuated tubes and an external condenser. The model consists of a hybrid long short-term memory (LSTM) model optimized by a moth-flame optimizer (MFO) used as a subroutine to obtain the optimal internal parameters of the LSTM model that maximize the forecasting accuracy. The model performance was compared with that of the standalone LSTM model. Both developed models were trained and tested using experimental data of the modified distiller and a conventional distiller. The thermal performance of both distillers is also compared in this article. The maximum daily distillate output achieved for the modified distiller was 3920 l/m2. The forecasted data of both models were compared using several statistical measures. For all measurements, LSTM-MFO outperformed standalone LSTM. The determination coefficient of the forecasted data using LSTM-MFO reached a high value of 0.999 for both solar distillers.The authors extend their appreciation to the Deanship of Scientific Research at Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University for funding this work through Research Group no. RG-21-12-03.Scopu

Study of performance, combustion, and emissions parameters of DI-diesel engine fueled with algae biodiesel/diesel/n-pentane blends

Biodiesel extracted from Scenedesmus obliquus algae through transesterification was used in the current study. Due to the disadvantages of using pure biodiesel in engines, it was used as B50 (a blend of 50% diesel and 50% biodiesel). To enhance engine performance, n-pentane was used in different extents of 5, 10, and 15 ml per liter as an enhancer additive. Through performance tests, it was found that 15 ml of n-pentane per liter was the best addition as it caused an increase in the brake thermal efficiency of 7.1% and a decrease in brake specific fuel consumption of 6.4% compared to the elegant B50. Whereas for exhaust gases, there was an increase in nitrogen oxides, which was associated with the significant increase in exhaust temperature and the high oxygen content present in B50. In comparison, hydrocarbons emission decreased by 7.2% compared to B50 in contrast to carbon dioxide which increased by 22.3% over B50. The carbon monoxide and oxygen concentrations of the exhaust gases also decreased by 17.35% and 9.5%, respectively compared to B50. The results obtained indicated that there are a significant improvements in pressure evolution and heat release data, which depend on the role of the mixed fuel addition of n-pentane.Scopu

Improvement of thermal performance of a solar box type cooker using SiO2/TiO2 nanolayer

An experimental analysis of a stepped solar box cooker (SSBC) improved using energetic SiO2/TiO2 nanoparticles. They were used in different ratios between 5% to 25% as a coating on a bar plate to enhance thermal performance. The SSBC was assessed experimentally to obtain a cost-effective solution and the best performance for the bar plate temperature, enabling increased cooking activities performance. The furious SiO2/TiO2 nanoparticles were coated over a bar plate, which allows them to absorb more solar radiation and increase the system of inner moist air temperature. The SiO2/TiO2 nanolayers used as 15% improved overall thermal efficiency by 31.42% of the system. The bar plate performances coated with SiO2/TiO2 nanolayers and used in SSBC were compared to other doping nanoparticles percentage for their solar thermal characteristics. The SiO2/TiO2 nanolayers coated by the SSBC is enabled to increase the performance by about 31.77%, 37.69%, 49.21%, 36.99%, and 34.66% when was used 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, and 25%, respectively and compared to that of single nanolayers (SiO2, TiO2) of convention cooker

Experimental investigation on the yield of solar still using manganese oxide nanoparticles coated absorber

Present research expresses an experimental investigation on nanoparticle use to enhance Solar still (SS) yield. Manganese Oxide (MNO2) is selected as a nanoparticle material and used in SS. The nanomaterial is added with the black chrome paint of the SS walls to increase the yield. The weight concentrations (WC) of MNO2 have been used from 20% to 50 to see its effect on SS yield. It has been observed that the heat transfer and water temperature enhanced by the use of the MNO2 nanoparticle with black chrome paint. The use of the MNO2 nanoparticle has improved the yield of the SS. It has also observed that the yield of SS enhanced by 19.5% compared with alone SS by use of WC of 20-50%. The SS with MNO2nanoparticle's payback time is 82 days at 20% WC than the alone SS of 98 days.This work was carried by the NPRP grant # NPRP11S-1221-170116 from the Qatar National Research Fund (a member of Qatar Foundation ). The statements made herein are solely the responsibility of the authors.Scopu

Performance enhancement of stepped basin solar still based on OSELM with traversal tree for higher energy adaptive control

A basin solar still precision design is regularly not reachable. To solve this issue, the basin area is coated with a nanolayer which allows to stimulate and control the multifaceted of the fast evaporations of physiognomies. The use of adaptive neural network-based approaches leads to better design cause permits detecting the conjunction, gigantic period feed, lower performances parameters which can be detrimental to system production. Further, an online Sequential Extreme Learning Machine (OSELM) system can be used to obtain the latest solar still based on adaptive control. Here, the solar still has been created at physical scale activity for haste of energy absorption. The performance of solar still is defined by the uniform occurrence with time series of dynamics transfer from basin liner to saline water. The feasibility scheme to authenticate was studied by applying calculation to the extensive heat transfer process. The furious SiO2/TiO2 nanoparticles used for the stepped basin solar still (SBSS) efficiency shows an increase of performances by 37.69% and 49.21%, respectively using 20% and 30% of SiO2/TiO2 coating. It is comparable higher when equated against an SBSS coating either SiO2 or TiO2, and/or no nanoparticles coatings. The binary search tree enabled to find the optimal cost for the solar still investigated and obtaining a superior design with higher performances

Investigation and performance analysis of solar still with energy storage materials: An energy- exergy efficiency analysis

Researchers have attempted different Energy storage materials (ESM) in solar stills (SS) to improve distillate yield. In this experimental work, an attempt was made to increase the distillate yield & efficiency of SS, using good absorbing and heat transfer capacity of ESM. A comparison was made between a conventional solar still (CSS) and a solar still with energy storage materials (SSWESM) in this experiment. Different energy storage materials like black color glass ball (BCGB), black granite (BG) and white marble stone (WMS) were used in equal quantity during experimental work. CSS and SSWESM had daily distillate yield of 1.4 kg/m2 and 2.5 kg/m2, respectively. The ESM boosts water evaporation during the day and releases heat at night, resulting in a higher distillate yield than CSS. Meanwhile, the exergy efficiency (?exe) of CSS and SSWESM were 4.99% and 12.55% respectively. Also the SSWESM gives 72.6% more daily efficiency (?) than CSS.The authors extend their appreciation to the Deanship of Scientific Research at Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University for funding this work through Research Group no. RG-21-12-03.Scopu