Accelerating vapor condensation with daytime radiative cooling

Abstract

Vapor condensation plays a crucial role in solar water-purification technologies. Conventional condensers in solar water-purification systems do not provide sufficient cooling power for vapor condensation, limiting the water production rate to $0.4 L m^{-2} hour^{-1}$. On the other hand, radiative dew condensation, a technique used by existing radiative dew condensers, only works at nighttime and is incompatible with solar water-purification technologies. Here, we develop daytime radiative condensers that reflect almost all solar radiation, and can thus create dew water even in direct sunlight. Compared to state-of-art condensers, our daytime radiative condenser doubles the production of purified water over a 24-hour period. The integration of our daytime radiative condenser with solar water-purification systems can increase the water production rate in sunlight from $0.4 L m^{-2} hour^{-1}$ to more than $1 L m^{-2} hour^{-1}$.