Teaching desalination

Abstract

Desalination is a multi-disciplinary engineering science that includes elements of heat, mass, and momentum transfer; thermodynamics; unit operations design; material engineering; energy conversion; water chemistry; corrosion; scale formation and fouling. This paper outlines desalination teaching through four main venues, which includes undergraduate engineering courses, graduate engineering courses, intensive training courses for engineers, and desalination research. The undergraduate and graduate engineering courses are taught as an elective component in the chemical/mechanical engineering curriculum. The contents of the undergraduate course provides the student with an overview of the desalination processes and elements of design, while the graduate course focuses on more detailed design calculations, process synthesis, process control, case studies, and use of computer packages for system design. The intensive training course for engineers includes introductory and advanced levels of instruction. The introductory training course includes historical background, process diagrams of thermal and membrane desalination processes, elements of design, performance parameters, associated processes, practice, and trends. The focus of the advanced training course is on the use of computer packages for system design, evaluation of real plant data, and cost estimation. The research program, which is part of the desalination education process, includes mathematical and experimental investigations that include system modeling, process control, study of fundamental phenomena, energy considerations, process synthesis, and use of new construction materials and chemicals.