Whenever we create a new site in SXA, by default there is an Empty partial design gets created and there are no components added to it.
What is the actual purpose of empty partial design? can we safely delete it?
You can safely remove it. It is added by default to somehow show users how to use Page and Partial Designs feature.
It is located in our branch for the site:
If you don't want to have it, remove it from the site or from the branch (but in case of branch changes, keep in mind that your changes will get overridden with SXA update).