Performance Study of Basin Type Solar Still with Different Concentrations of Water-Al2O3 Nanofluids

In this paper, a comparison of the performance of single basin single slope solar still with water and with water based nanofluid of Aluminium Oxide (Al2O3) has been made. For this, two experimental solar stills of the same basin area have been fabricated and tested for their identical thermal performance. These solar stills have been used to compare the performance with water in one solar still and water-based nanofluid in the other solar still by performing experiments at the same location and time. It is found that the solar still with water based Aluminium Oxide (Al2O3) nanofluid having concentrations 0.05%, 0.1%,0.15% and 0.2% enhances the output of the solar still as compared to the water by 18.54%, 22.26%, 24.37% and 20.38%, respectively, thus giving an optimum value of enhanced output at 0.15% concentration.