We explored repurposing discarded materials to construct simple, field expedient, solar heating devices capable of heating drinking water to water pasteurization temperatures. Results of different test configurations quickly constructed from junk material indicate important design parameters to include maximizing exposed container surface area and using transparent glass and dark absorbent mate...

A solar trigeneration system for off-grid households, based on photovoltaic-thermal (PV/T) collectors, photovoltaic (PV) modules and a heat pump (HP), whose aim is to provide enough electricity, domestic hot water (DHW), heating and cooling power to meet the typical demand of an offgrid single family dwelling, is modeled to predict its performance, enable system sizing and evaluate the impact o...

Solar thermal water heating systems reduce household energy bills by using the free solar radiation provided by the sun to heat water for residential needs. In order to eliminate the need for electricity to run a pump to drive the fluid circulation in these systems, fluid buoyancy effects can be employed to move the fluid from lower elevations to higher elevations. There are several operational...

A novel type of solar thermal water disinfection unit is presented in this work. The system is safe and easy to use and can be built with basic tools and widely available materials. In the unit, water is disinfected by temperature increase up to the boiling point and output is controlled by the change in density. For employing the change in density to control the water output, a dimensioning pr...

Up to now solar heat has been stored mostly in well insulated water tanks. The volume of these tanks is as large as 3 m3 for relatively high solar fractions and up to 70 m3 for full solar coverage for a single-family house. Storage tanks of this size are expensive and space consuming. In new buildings, provisions can be made to accommodate large storage volumes but this type of system is not li...