A wind/diesel hybrid system with desalination for Star Island, NH: feasibility study results

A feasibility study of a small-scale photovoltaic-powered reverse osmosis desalination plant for potable water and salt production in Madura Island: A techno-economic evaluation

A theoretical analysis on upgrading desalination plants with low-salt-rejection reverse osmosis

With a reverse osmosis (RO) desalination plant designed to satisfy only the contracted-for water supply, the water company would be missing out on potential benefits that could have been obtained selling water in periods of high demand. On the other hand, sizing the RO desalination plant to produce water to satisfy peak demand means incurring additional costs as well as having the plant partially idle during periods of average or low demand. A model was developed using Excel macros to perform dynamic programming to optimize the capacity expansion of an RO desalination plant. The objective function is to maximize the present value of the total net benefits over the lifetime of the RO desalination plant. The model can be used to test different scenarios to capture time-variant tourism demand and price uncertainties on investment decisions. This study focuses on tourism dominated arid coastal regions, using Sharm El Sheikh (Sharm) in South Sinai, Egypt, as an example.19 RO plants in Sharm were surveyed and data were collected including unit production costs, O&M costs, energy consumption rates, contracted-for water supply, and utilization. Unit production cost of an RO desalination plant varies according to the degree of operation of the plant. This fact has to be taken into consideration when calculating the costs of RO desalination and when deciding on the plant capacity in order to maximize the total net benefit. Using the collected data, cost functions were developed for O&M costs as a function of utilization and plant capacity. The cost model calculated similar values to the actual total net benefit for one of the surveyed RO plant taken as an example. Using the optimization model, the maximum total net benefit is obtained with a smaller installed capacity than the actual case. A modified pricing structure is suggested in the paper that ties the water selling price to consumption in an effort to reduce demand in excess of contracted-for water supply aiding the water company to fulfill its contractual commitments to all users. However, price elasticity has to be taken into consideration to determine the impact of price change on water demand.

Energy management and DSM techniques for a PV-diesel powered sea water reverse osmosis desalination plant in Ginostra, Sicily

Capital cost estimation of RO plants: GCC countries versus southern Europe

Modeling, control, and dynamic performance analysis of a reverse osmosis desalination plant integrated within hybrid energy systems


 Seawater intake and its treatments are one of the main upstream processes of every seawater desalination plant (RO, ED, MSF, MED). However, the process has turned out to be of utmost importance for reverse osmosis (RO) desalination plant. It is to be sure that sufficient and steady flow and quality of water is available to the RO desalination plant. Prior to RO feed water, the seawater intake pre-treatment process has to be tailored and the quality of seawater intake to be treated either subsurface intake or open surface intakes, particularly when treating open surface intakes seawater (OSIS) with exceedingly unpredictable quality. According to the well-established membrane manufacturer and supplier, the RO membrane warranty and guarantee are depended on seawater intake quality and its pre-treatment. Thus, the current state-of-the-art RO membranes life and performance success for desalination processing depend upon OSIS pre-treatment processing techniques. This article is emphasizing an overview on recent OSIS and its pre-treatment techniques for RO desalination plant.

Today, reverse osmosis membranes are the leading technology for new desalination installations, however, a challenge facing widespread application of RO technology is membrane fouling. In the present study, we used an environmentally friendly green inhibitor as anti-scaling and anti-biofouling in reverse osmosis (RO) desalination plants. The influence of Sargassum sp., Corallina mediterranea, and Avicennia marina on RO membrane mineral scaling was evaluated using gypsum as a model scalant. Antibacterial properties for three marine extracts from Sargassum sp., C. mediterranea, and Avicennia marina were investigated with Gram-positive bacteria (ArthrobactersulfureusYACS14, Staphylococcus aureus) and Gram-negative bacteria (VibrioanguillarumMVM425, Escherichia coli). The antimicrobial results were detected for the two selected extracts as the most potent extracts (ethyl acetate, methanol crude extracts of the Avicennia marina leaves). Data showed that ratios of 3 and 5% recorded the highest suppression percentages (100%) for all tested bacteria including bacterial community collected from Eastern Harbor. On the other side, data confirmed that the anti-scalant properties by 100 ppm of Avicennia marina leave extract giving 85% of scale inhibition. The effect of Avicennia marina leaves extract for calcium sulfate dihydrate (gypsum) scaling on selected reverse osmosis (RO) membrane surfaces was investigated. The effect of different concentrations of Avicennia marina leaves extract was observed in the extent of surface scale coverage and surface crystal size among the membrane studied.

Techno-economic assessment of a hybrid RO-MED desalination plant integrated with a solar CHP system

This chapter reviews wind technology, its development, and its utilization for the production of fresh or potable water via desalination systems. Wind turbines can be used to supply electricity or mechanical power to desalination plants for the desalination of brackish water or seawater. In rural and remote areas, the use of small wind turbines in mini-grids or stand-alone (off-grid) applications is essential for the improvement of inhabitants' lives and their socioeconomic development. Wind turbines to drive reverse osmosis (RO) units are the second most-used combination, following that of photovoltaic RO systems. In addition, a small number of applications exist around the combination of wind technology with mechanical vapor compression and electrodialysis desalination technology. Wind turbines are basically classified by the position of their rotational axis. Thus there is the horizontal-axis wind turbine and the vertical-axis wind turbine.

the adaption of renewable energy (RE) in electric systems (ESs) involves many technical challenges when its share exceeds certain levels. Various strategies are used to manage these challenges. The reverse osmosis (RO) desalination plants can play a significant role in RE integration because of their high energy consumption and flexibility of operation. This paper investigates how RO desalination plants can help in integrating RE resources in ESs. First, the impact of different levels of RE penetration on IEEE 30-bus system was studied in terms of voltage profile. Then, the adaption of an RO plant in the system as a flexible load was introduced to reduce the effects of RE penetration. The consumption of RO plant was decreased during the absence of RE and increased at the midday hours to absorb the surplus power generated by RE. This prevented the ES voltage profile to fall below the permissible limits. The results showed that, the coordination between RO plants and ESs operation had a significant positive role.

To solve the problems of high specific energy consumption and excessive harmful ions in the water production of a small reverse osmosis (RO) plant, a desalination system coupling RO and membrane capacitive deionization (MCDI) is proposed in this study. Aiming at producing two cubic meters per day of fresh water with a salt concentration of less than 280 mg L−1, parameter matching optimization was carried out on two desalination system schemes of one-stage two-section RO and one-stage three-section RO coupled with MCDI. The results were compared with the parameter matching optimization results of the one-stage one-section RO and the one-stage two-section pure RO desalination system. The results show that compared with the pure RO desalination mode, the seawater desalination mode coupled with RO and MCDI reduces the specific energy consumption under the same effluent salt concentration. Moreover, it decreases the feed water pressure in front of the RO membrane, which can reduce the standard of high-pressure pump in a small seawater desalination plant. The energy consumption of the one-stage three-section RO and MCDI coupling system is lower than that of the one- stage two-section RO and MCDI coupling system, and the feed water pressure is also lower.

Sea and ocean Reverse Osmosis (RO) desalination plants are often designed to remove more than 90% of dissolved ingredients (organic and inorganic) from feed water, thus creating a permeate water that is potable. Typically 40–60% of the feed water is recovered as permeate water. The water not recovered as permeate becomes concentrated into a stream of RO concentrate (brine) because the salts rejected by RO remain in the unrecovered water. The RO concentrate is usually about 1.67 to 2.5 times the salt concentration of the source water, but can be as high as four times. RO concentrate discharged into a source water body is a major environmental consideration during the planning and design of bay or ocean desalination plants. Co-location of desalination plants with wastewater treatment plants or power plants allows using a shared outfall to dilute the high salt concentration of RO concentrate. Diluting the RO concentrate in a shared effluent outfall mitigates the issue of high salinity around the outfall. This paper compares side by side two main classes of water bodies that receive concentrated brine discharge from Reverse Osmosis (RO) Desalination Plants: oceans (or open seas) and estuarine bays (under the influence of fresh water). These two classes of water bodies have inherent properties which drive not only the operation of RO plants, but also the physical and chemical reactions of outfall discharge. Major differences between oceans and estuarine bays are evident when comparing salinity levels, variability of salinity, and variability of the overall water quality. Furthermore, there are differences in terms of flora and fauna. Using a nuanced approach of comparing and contrasting oceans and estuarine bays as receiving waters for desalination plant concentrate, this paper brings to light the natural processes occurring offshore of potential desalination plant sites, and distinguishes what natural processes may be affected by brine entering the ecosystem.

Performance evaluation of reverse osmosis desalination plant: A case study of Wadi Ma'in, Zara and Mujib Plant

Impact of solar energy cost on water production cost of seawater desalination plants in Egypt