Thermal and Economic Analysis of Low-Cost Water Heater made by Plastic Tub

The solar water heater is renewable technology that simply uses sunlight to heat water. Solar water heating Technology using sunlight is very useful for heating water for domestic as well as industrial use. This technology saves energy and reduces the load on non-renewable resources. Now a days electrical appliances are used to heat the water for domestic as well as industrial use, and this is a very expensive method of heating water. In areas where sunlight is available, the solar water heater can be used effectively for heating water with the help of Sunlight. This technology is less expensive compare to the electrical water heater as well as it is very useful for the areas where electrical power cut is a big problem. In this research paper a domestic plastic water storage container or tub is converted to a solar water heater and this design is further analyzed experimentally. The solar water heater design includes an insulated storage tub reflector made of card and an Aluminum foil floating cover made of bamboo strip. The suggested design of a solar water heater increases the intensity of solar energy for water heating applications and it is almost free for lower-income groups population, as the proposed water heater will cost only Rs 0.048/L (US$0.0006/L). A mathematical model has been developed for the proposed solar water heater and validated with the help of experimental results for a typical winter day in Raipur, CG, India (21.2514 degrees N, 81.6296 degrees E). The proposed water heater is compared with and without the reflector. It has been observed that the heater with a reflector shows better performance than a heater without a reflector. The maximum water temperature achieved in a day is 37.6 degrees C, water is heated maximum up to 17.6 degrees C for heater with reflector. The total amount of heat energy supplied for a day is 1812.2kJ which is about 13% more than the total heat supplied to water without heater. This technology is very useful and cheaper in cost as compare to electrical water heating or any other type of water heating sources. The daily thermal efficiency of proposed heater is 27.2%.