Solar Water Distiller Questions

Solar Water Distiller

Diana and Alice

1. How many liters should a personal solar distiller produce per month? (How much water is needed to charge the battery of a solar installation? How many batteries does a solar installation use? How many solar installations does the average person have?)
2. According to Trojan batteries: The frequency of the watering “depend on how the battery is used and the operating temperature. “With this in mind new installation should be monitored closely, perhaps weekly, to establish the watering frequency required.”   Was monitoring done? If yes, how many liters of water per month does the battery require?
3. How much money can a person afford to build/buy the solar water distiller?
4. What is the cost of locally manufacturing labor?
5. What is the cost of local glass sheets? Please provide sizes available.
6. What is the cost of clear polycarbonate sheets? Please provide sizes available
7. Portability: Does the Solar water distiller stays outside day and night, or does it need to be transferred into the house nightly?

Attribute	Metric (how to assess)	Unit	Value
Distilled water production	volume of water	liter/kg	?
Affordability/Material and Labour	cost	money	?
Locally manufactured and maintained	manufacturing time	hours	1 hour
Safe to touch	temperature of outside of distiller	Celsius	*Max 48°C
Portability? Need to store at night?	how heavy the distiller is	kilograms	7 kgs

Goals:

We aim to build a personal solar distiller for households that use solar panels. We want the distiller to be affordable, safe, easy to assemble, quick to evaporate water, and made with with local materials.

Because water distilling is a slow process, we want to optimize the ratio between the volume of water the distiller is capable of holding and the speed of the evaporation, as both are ideally our priorities.  Also, the higher the temperature, the faster the water evaporation. However, this might compromise safety.

*According to the American Burn Association SCALD INJURY PREVENTION Educator’s Guide A Community Fire and Burn Prevention Program Supported by the United States Fire Administration Federal Emergency Management Agency: “The most common regulatory standard for the maximum temperature of water delivered by residential water heaters to the tap is 120 degrees Fahrenheit/48 degrees Celsius. At this temperature, the skin of adults requires an average of five minutes of exposure for a full thickness burn to occur. When the temperature of a hot liquid is increased to 140o F/60o C it takes only five seconds or less for a serious burn to occur. (Source: http://www.ameriburn.org/Preven/ScaldInjuryEducator'sGuide.pdf)