Mass transfer experimental investigation and optimisation analysis of zeolite-coated fin-tube heat exchangers in a novel concept of an atmospheric water generator designed for arid climatic conditions

•A new concept of an atmospheric water generator utilising DCHEs is presented.•The mass transfer performance of the zeolite-coated heat exchangers is studied.•The experimental analysis is realised under arid (dry and hot) climatic conditions.•The results are used to optimise the AWG’s moisture mass transfer (MT) performance.•The moisture MT performance is simulated for Riyadh and Tamanrasset climates. Four zeolite-coated fin-tube heat exchangers were manufactured and experimentally tested under steady-state arid climatic conditions to analyse the influence of inlet air conditions on the mass transfer performance properties. These tests involved nine operational states with ambient air temperatures ranging from 15 °C to 35 °C and humidity ratios ranging from 5 g/kg to 10 g/kg. The obtained experimental results were utilised to analyse and optimise the potential mass transfer performance of a novel atmospheric water generator (AWG) concept explicitly designed for arid climatic conditions. Firstly, the influence of the adsorption/desorption time duration on the mass transfer performance parameters was investigated. The results demonstrated the positive effect of the process intensification: the moisture transferred during one adsorption/desorption cycle decreased slightly by an average of 6 %, while the duration time of both processes decreased considerably by an average of 32.4 %. Secondly, an annual simulation analysis was conducted to analyse the potential mass transfer performance of the presented AWG concept under the arid climatic conditions of Riyadh and Tamanrasset. The results revealed that shortening the entire cycle increased the annual moisture transferred from 893 kg to 1518 kg for Riyadh and from 899 kg to 1500 kg for Tamanrasset climatic conditions.