The influence of heat collector structural parameters on the solar chimneys integrated with seawater desalination

An unsteady-state mathematical model of the heat transfer and flow of the integrated system under no-load condition has been developed. The influence of heat collector structural parameters on the system has been researched. The results show that the negative pressure, draft force, velocity and airflow temperature rise of integrated system increase significantly with the increasing of collector diameter. The collector diameter has no influence to the seawater temperature, glass cover temperature and hourly freshwater yield per unit area basically. With the increasing of collector inlet height, the negative pressure, velocity and temperature rise decrease, the seawater temperature and the glass cover temperature also decrease. The amplitude value of the glass cover temperature drop is bigger than that of the water temperature drop. The hourly freshwater yield increases in certain time periods and decreases in other time periods. The influence of collector inlet height on the characteristics of integrated system has a tendency to weaken with the increasing of collector inlet height.