TY - JOUR
T1 - A greener seawater desalination method by direct-contact spray evaporation and condensation (DCSEC)
T2 - Experiments
AU - Alrowais, Raid
AU - Qian, Chen
AU - Burhan, Muhammad
AU - Ybyraiymkul, Doskhan
AU - Shahzad, Muhammad Wakil
AU - Ng, Kim Choon
PY - 2020/10/1
Y1 - 2020/10/1
N2 - Owing to the high specific energy consumption of conventional seawater desalination methods available hitherto, there is much motivation for designing greener desalination processes. As a greener desalination process, it should consume lower top-brine temperatures for the seawater feed as well as minimum chemical use for brine treatment. In this paper, a direct-contact spray-assisted evaporation and condensation (DCSEC) is presented that addresses the above-mentioned requirements of greener desalination. We have tested both the single-stage and multi-stage configurations of DCSEC process with seawater (3.5% by weight salinity) from Red Sea. The performance of the system was investigated for a feed flow rate of 6 L/minute when the evaporator chamber temperature was varied from 38 °C to 60 °C. From the experiments, maximum distillate production of 31 L/hr m3 was recorded at 60 °C feed temperature for a single-stage configuration. To further enhance the distillate production of DCSEC, an innovative micro/nano-bubbles (M/NBs) generator device is incorporated in the feed supply system which resulted in 34% increase in potable water production at the corresponding inlet feed temperatures.
AB - Owing to the high specific energy consumption of conventional seawater desalination methods available hitherto, there is much motivation for designing greener desalination processes. As a greener desalination process, it should consume lower top-brine temperatures for the seawater feed as well as minimum chemical use for brine treatment. In this paper, a direct-contact spray-assisted evaporation and condensation (DCSEC) is presented that addresses the above-mentioned requirements of greener desalination. We have tested both the single-stage and multi-stage configurations of DCSEC process with seawater (3.5% by weight salinity) from Red Sea. The performance of the system was investigated for a feed flow rate of 6 L/minute when the evaporator chamber temperature was varied from 38 °C to 60 °C. From the experiments, maximum distillate production of 31 L/hr m3 was recorded at 60 °C feed temperature for a single-stage configuration. To further enhance the distillate production of DCSEC, an innovative micro/nano-bubbles (M/NBs) generator device is incorporated in the feed supply system which resulted in 34% increase in potable water production at the corresponding inlet feed temperatures.
KW - Direct spray evaporator and condenser design
KW - Micro-vapor-bubble enhancement
KW - Multi-stage
KW - Thermally-driven seawater desalination
U2 - 10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2020.115629
DO - 10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2020.115629
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85087708240
SN - 1359-4311
VL - 179
JO - Applied Thermal Engineering
JF - Applied Thermal Engineering
M1 - 115629
ER -
