Design of Portable Shell and Tube Heat Exchanger for a Solar Powered Water Distiller

This study presents theoretical considerations and results of a portable shell and tube heat exchanger in a solar water distiller system. The device is composed of a glass heat exchanger, which served as a condenser for vapor condensing which were produced in black paint solar absorber. It was also composed of a tank for water source and a tank for produced distilled water. Shell and tube was designed and simulated using an implicit numerical scheme. Simulation results showed that accumulated mass water greatly depended on the inlet vapor temperature and volume, heat exchanger material, coolant water temperature and volume. Thus, changing the material from stainless steel to glass in the same condition （vapor temperature, vapor volume, coolant temperature and coolant volume）. These inexpensive shell and tube heat exchangers permitted to produce 40 litre/day, distilled water from vapor with 378 K inlet temperature in atmosphere pressure. If inlet pressure increases, vapor temperature will decline and thereupon, heat exchanger＇s efficiency tangibility will increase.

Advances and challenges of methanol-tolerant oxygen reduction reaction electrocatalysts for the direct methanol fuel cell

Methanol cross-over effects from the anode to the cathode are important parameters for reducing catalytic performance in direct methanol fuel cells.A promising candidate catalyst for the cathode in direct methanol fuel cells must have excellent activity toward oxygen reduction reaction and resistance to methanol oxidation reaction.This review focuses on the methanol tolerant noble metal-based electrocatalysts,including platinum and palladium-based alloys,noble metal–carbon based composites,transition metal-based catalysts,carbon-based metal catalysts,and metal-free catalysts.The understanding of the correlation between the activity and the synthesis method,electrolyte environment and stability issues are highlighted.For the transition metal-based catalyst,their activity,stability and methanol tolerance in direct methanol fuel cells and comparisons with those of platinum are particularly discussed.Finally,strategies to enhance the methanol tolerance and hinder the generation of mixed potential in direct methanol fuel cells are also presented.This review provides a perspective for future developments for the scientist in selecting suitable methanol tolerate catalyst for oxygen reduction reaction and designing high-performance practical direct methanol fuel cells.

Development of a portable mid-infrared methane detection device

Based on direct absorption spectroscopy(DAS), a portable methane(CH_4) detection device was implemented. The device mainly includes a dual-channel non-dispersive infrared sensor(integrated with an infrared light source, light path and pyroelectric detector), a driving circuit of the sensor, an ARM11 embedded Win CE system, and a Lab VIEW-based data-processing platform. Experiments were carried out with prepared CH_4 samples to investigate the sensing performance. The relative detection error is less than 9.14% within the measuring range of 0—7×10^(-2). For a CH_4 sample with concentration of 0(i.e., pure nitrogen), the measured concentration fluctuation range is-1.2×10^(-5)—+2×10^(-5). An Allan deviation analysis on the gas sample with concentration of 0 indicates that the 1σ limit of detection(LoD) of the device is 4.8×10^(-6) with an average time of 1 s. Experiments were performed on three CH_4 samples with different concentrations to test the response time, which is validated to be less than 20 s. Due to the small size of the ARM11 embedded system and the powerful data processing capability of the Lab VIEW platform, the proposed portable and miniaturized CH_4 sensor shows a good application prospect in mining operations and some other industrial fields.