Yuan Peng, Men Chuanling, Zhao Liming, Cao Pei, Yang Zhengpeng, Niu Yutao, Zhang Yongyi, Yu Yingying, Li Qingwen
School of Energy and Power Engineering, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, China.
Key Laboratory of Multifunctional Nanomaterials and Smart Systems, Advanced Materials Division, Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Suzhou 215123, China.
ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2022 Apr 6;14(13):15549-15557. doi: 10.1021/acsami.2c01757. Epub 2022 Mar 22.
Benefiting from the abundant solar energy and the emergence of photothermal conversion equipment, solar-driven water evaporation has shown great potential in seawater desalination. One common problem for solar-thermal evaporation is that the salt crystallized on the surface of solar absorbers during the seawater evaporation process will significantly deteriorate the continuity and efficiency of the evaporation process. In most reports, efforts have been made to transfer the accumulated salts, while the studies on preventing salt crystallization, which leads to better continuity of the production, are limited. Herein, a spontaneous salt-preventing solar-thermal water evaporator was designed, utilizing a dual-mode water transfer structure consisting of in-plane diffusion and in-tube migration. The dual-mode structural system gave rise to uniform and continuous water transfer, efficiently suppressing the salt concentration in the evaporator. As a result, salt crystallization was scarcely found on the surface of the evaporator under 1 sun irradiation for an ultralong time (200 h), demonstrating its high efficiency in inhibiting salt crystallization. In addition, the small contact area between the water and the evaporator could reduce the heat loss during the solar-thermal evaporation process, which further improved the water evaporation rate (1.64 kg m h).
得益于丰富的太阳能以及光热转换设备的出现，太阳能驱动的水蒸发在海水淡化方面展现出了巨大潜力。太阳能热蒸发的一个常见问题是，在海水蒸发过程中，太阳能吸收器表面结晶的盐会显著降低蒸发过程的连续性和效率。在大多数报告中，人们致力于转移积累的盐分，而对于防止盐结晶从而实现更好生产连续性的研究却很有限。在此，设计了一种自发防盐的太阳能热水蒸发器，它利用了由面内扩散和管内迁移组成的双模水传输结构。这种双模结构系统实现了均匀且连续的水传输，有效抑制了蒸发器内的盐浓度。结果，在1个太阳辐照下超长时间（200小时）内，蒸发器表面几乎未发现盐结晶，证明了其在抑制盐结晶方面的高效性。此外，水与蒸发器之间较小的接触面积可以减少太阳能热蒸发过程中的热损失，这进一步提高了水蒸发速率（1.64 kg m² h）。
