Effect of CaCl2 on the Evaporation Reduction ability of Cetyl Alcohol

Abstract

World is heading towards water crises due to rapid increase in population and industrial growth. In order to overcome water crisis it is necessary to develop novel techniques of water conservation. Retardation of water evaporation by using chemicals is one such novel method for the conservation of water. Cetyl alcohol is found to be very effective in reducing water evaporation. Here, efficiency of cetyl alcohol as water evaporation retardant (WER) is studied in the presence of CaCl 2 . Calcium and chloride ions are commonly found in the most of natural reservoirs hence this study is useful for the assessment of efficiency of cetyl alcohol as WER in natural water reservoirs. Presence of calcium and chloride ions is found to be supportive in water evaporation retardation moreover it is observed that efficiency of cetyl alcohol remains unaffected by the presence of CaCl 2 . Keywords: Water, evaporation, retardation, fatty alcohol, cetyl alcohol I.INTRODUCTION Water is the most crucial compound exists on the earth. Two third part of earth is covered with the water but only 2.5 % of total water is potable water. Out of 2.5% potable water only 1 % is accessible while remaining 1.5% potable water is trapped in snowfields and glaciers 1 . Nowadays demand of potable water is increasing day by day due to increase in population and industrialization. This increasing demand of water leads us towards water crises. It is believed that water crises can create serious threat to mankind in upcoming years 2 . In order to overcome this problem it is necessary to employ new techniques for the conservation of water. Evaporation retardation by using chemicals is a technique which can prove useful for the conservation of water. In 1925, it was found that certain compounds which can form layer on water surface can considerably retard water evaporation. These substances are termed as "Water evaporation retardants" and popularly known as "WER" 3 . Comprehensive study of many compounds has been carried out in laboratory to identify such compounds which can effectively work as WER. In 1927, Langmuir found that straight chain fatty alcohols such as cetyl alcohol can effectively retard evaporation of water 4 . After laboratory scale investigations, the first field experiment for the testing of cetyl alcohol was carried out in Australia around 1950 and it was found that cetyl alcohol can retard evaporation of water up to 30% 5 . Success of this field trial catches worldwide attention and comprehensive research in this area has been carried out rapidly 6 to 13 . Reputed research institutes of many countries like United States of America, Australia, India, Israel etc. have started comprehensive studies in this area of research. After comprehensive laboratory research and field trial cetyl alcohol is found to be an effective evaporation retardant. Most of laboratory investigations are made by using distilled water. Idea behind this practice is to eliminate probable errors in the estimation of evaporation reduction arises due to presenc...