Regulation of the array evaporator for highly efficient solar-driven interfacial evaporation

Solar-driven interfacial evaporation is considered as a promising approach to alleviate water scarcity. Through array-based design, the total evaporation area can be expanded without increasing the size of individual units, thereby enabling higher evaporation rates. However, in densely packed array structures, vapor tends to accumulate in the gaps between units, which suppresses the evaporation process and significantly limits the evaporation performance per unit area. To achieve higher evaporation rates, the present study systematically explores the influence of spatial arrangement on array evaporator performance, taking a 4 × 4 configuration as a representative case. Simulation results revealed that the natural evaporation rate reached a maximum of 0.46 kg m −2 h −1 when the spacing between adjacent evaporators was approximately 2.4 cm. Further analysis showed that when the radius of the evaporator was less than 0.8 cm, the optimal spacing was approximately three times the radius; whereas for radius larger than 0.8 cm, the optimal spacing stabilized around 2.4 cm, indicating a size-dependent spacing optimization strategy. In outdoor experiments, the optimized array evaporator achieved a maximum condensate collection rate of 0.70 kg m −2 h −1 , with an average condensate collection rate 1.74 times higher than that of the control group. This study proposes a systematic spacing optimization strategy for array evaporator, providing a valuable reference for the future large-scale application of solar desalination technology.