Provision of potable water from brackish or saline feed water is a challenge in households of remote off-grid islands and coastal areas. An effort to study a small-scale desalination system comprising an evacuated tube collector (ETC) basin and an air-cooled condenser with the ultimate goal to produce fresh water in a decentralised manner has been carried out in this work. Experiments were performed on a solar distillation unit comprising a coupled 1 m2 ETC basin and 0.46 m2 air-cooled

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... in climate conditions of Bhavnagar, Gujarat, India. A maximum of 5.47 kg/day potable water of 50 ppm was obtained from seawater as feed, the average efficiency being 18.48% of the test setup. The volume of feed water charged in the basin played a vital role in the productivity, with the maximum distillate being attainable at 90% occupied volume.