Abstract
Water shortages have become a major global crisis and can be a significant challenge for many countries. Fog collection technology is a sustainable and cheap remedy that contributes to reducing the effect of water shortages. Herein, a hydrophobic fog collector is presented that improves the fog collection rate by using a combination of acrylic paint spray and vanilla air freshener spray, inspired by lotus leaves and beetles (Qu et al. (2008) Langmuir 24:4185–4189; Zhu et al. (2019) Mater Today Nano 6:100034). This coating can be used by companies that produce fog collectors to enhance the water collected by their fog collectors in arid and semi-arid regions. The two sprays were sprayed successively onto an aluminum fiber mesh. In addition, two rectangular polylactic acid (PLA) meshes with different axis angles were tested for fog collection. The fog was created artificially in the laboratory using a fogging system comprising a fog pump and two water nozzles with connections. The mesh was fixed 1.25 m away from the nozzles. Fog collection performance was tested experimentally by measuring the quantity of water captured by the coated mesh during fog harvesting for a known time. The results were compared with those for the pristine aluminum mesh. The results showed that the hydrophobic coating enhanced the fog collection by slightly more than 100%. The coated surface had an average fog collection rate of 13 kg/m2h, while the uncoated aluminum mesh achieved 6.45 kg/m2h. For the PLA meshes, the mesh with horizontal and vertical axes and the mesh with inclined axes achieved fog collection rates of approximately 4.8 kg/m2h and 3.2 kg/m2h, respectively. Thus, the inclination led to a rate reduction.
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Elshennawy, A.A., Abdelaal, M.Y., Hamed, A.M. et al. Fog collection rate investigation for a hydrophobic surface and different inclinations of rectangular meshes. Euro-Mediterr J Environ Integr (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41207-024-00519-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41207-024-00519-x