Effect of different wick materials on solar still performance–a review

Solar distillation techniques are of high significance to provide human needs of freshwater. Even though these techniques are simple and economic, their output distillate production is low. One of the modern significant modifications performed to enlarge the rate of evaporation inside the solar stills is using the wick materials with various types and different arrangements, hence the freshwater yield could be improved. To obtain the significance of the wicks, in some cases, the productivity of a solar still was enlarged by 180% with providing a wick material as will be discussed later in this review. As a result, in this manuscript, a generalised survey of the effects of using different wicks on the performance of not only the conventional still but also of all types of solar stills is presented. Besides, satisfying conclusions are summarised to help the researchers intending to work on the wick type solar still.