Novel technological solutions for eco-protective water supply by economical and sustainable seawater desalination

Abstract

Development of novel and economical technological solutions for enviro-sensitive seawater desalination enabling the abolishment of marine ecosystem deteriorations due to brine discharges has a vital and indispensable importance for sustainable water supply worldwide. The encouragement of environmental decision policies that focus on reducing energy footprints by novel water and wastewater treatment plants is also prioritized as a very prominent reality for their widespread acceptability and realization in new age. In this respect, eleven innovative systems differentiated into two main groups, namely with and without brine discharge, were developed for exposing their techno-economical sustainability capabilities in enviro-protective seawater desalination. Depending on experimental performances, the systems arranged with different configurations of membrane distillation and forward osmosis at three heat recovery choices for natural gas or waste heat usage were individually simulated in real scale. The field simulations revealed that a more economical seawater desalination was provided by waste heat than that by RO, MD, and MED regardless of carbon tax liability. Zero brine discharge was assured using external fresh water with no additional cost at 31% loss per drinking water. This study finally claims that the developed systems can be successfully and cost-effectively implemented for eco-protective water supply from seawater in semi-arid, sub-tropical, temperate, and weak-temperate countries. (C) 2018 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.