A small scale multi-effect distillation (MED) unit for rural micro enterprises: Part II — Parametric studies and performance analysis Original Research Article

The aspects of fabrication, design and operation with design optimization of various components of the small scale multiple effect distillation (MED) unit have been discussed in part I of the paper. The MED system can be operated as n effects + condenser (n + C), where 1 ≤ n ≤ 9. Extensive experiments were carried out respectively using 9 + C, 6 + C and 3 + C systems. The present part II is devoted to analysis and optimization of the product yield, and economics, based on parametric studies varying the input conditions for all the aforementioned three systems. The most important input parameters for operation of the MED system are the input steam pressure, and the number of effects used. The most important output parameter is the total distillate produced per hour.