Nuclear desalination is more efficient though
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2019/07/14/megadroug...
Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
161–170 of 241 posts
Re: Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why not release the salt back to the sea? Presumably it would not increase the salt content of the ocean very much considering the vastness of the ocean and the sheer quantity of fresh water that is being added to it by melting glaciers, etc? What am I missing?
The salt you release isn't instantly diluted in the whole ocean and we're speaking, for a plant, of millions cubic meters of salt enriched water per day. The release area is just dying.
This makes sense to me. I wonder how feasible it would be to release the saltier water over a broader area to reduce the salinity in any one area? Also, there are at least some ecological benefits to increasing the amount of fresh water. An extreme example is the lake that appeared in the middle of a desert in the United Arab Emirates. I have no idea how we weigh one against another.
Re: Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
#163FTA: "Unlike some desalination systems, there is no accumulation of salt or concentrated brines to be disposed of. In a free-floating configuration, any salt that accumulates during the day would simply be carried back out at night through the wicking material and back into the seawater, according to the researchers." The capabilities are freaking interesting, but let's say someone builds a big enough settlement on a…
This chunk from the article is, unfortunately, an outright lie. By definition, removing salt from seawater leaves you with water and salt. The article handwaves the salt away by supposing that the desalinator will float on top of the ocean. In actual production configurations other than towing it behind your sailboat, you will end up with a brine pool that needs to be disposed of, or a concentration in the wicking ma…
> supposing that the desalinator will float on top of the ocean.
I think that as its solar, you only have 50% duty cycle (more or less) so the idea is that you "just" slow down the water supply to remove the salt over night.
Re: Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
#164FTA: "Unlike some desalination systems, there is no accumulation of salt or concentrated brines to be disposed of. In a free-floating configuration, any salt that accumulates during the day would simply be carried back out at night through the wicking material and back into the seawater, according to the researchers." The capabilities are freaking interesting, but let's say someone builds a big enough settlement on a…
Why release the salt back into sea water? This is salt production alongside desalination.
We already have a massive oversupply of salt from existing desalination. The cost of table salt is basically all transportation at this point.
Re: Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
#165When the $100 system can run for 5 years of continuous production get back to me. I would be surprised if the system, as described, would work beyond a couple of days. Other than for emergency situations this isn't useful.
Re: Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
Salt release is already a huge environmental concern with exiting desalinization systems. Energy consumption and installation costs aren't the sole (and probably not the main) problems. Desalinization is inherently a pollution.
Why not release the salt back to the sea? Presumably it would not increase the salt content of the ocean very much considering the vastness of the ocean and the sheer quantity of fresh water that is being added to it by melting glaciers, etc? What am I missing?
Why not just collect the salt, and sell it as... salt? Even if its not ok for cooking, it should be fine for roads? I am sure there are other industrial uses for salt.
Re: Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
#167California is building the largest desalination plant in the US.(2015) Is this ready yet ??
Re: Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
#168"Tests on an MIT building rooftop showed that a simple proof-of-concept desalination device could produce..." So doesn't look like they've even hooked it up to the sea yet, so still a bit to go for a real implementation, but still sounds interesting. I harbour a small dream that I could buy some seaside land someday on a Greek island and hook one of these desalination devices up to the sea and build myself a small oa…
The device itself would not be "on" the sea, it would just get water from it with a pipe/pump. I don't really see any reason it wouldn't work the same way by the sea: the main problem seems to be how to remove the salt, efficiently, not how to get water into the device, which is easier. Getting enough sun might even be harder than getting sea water.
Yep, and that's what I basically meant by 'hooking it up'.
I guess you would need a pump to bring the seawater to the device, something to pump it elsewhere (for storage, or irrigation), and also some mechanism to dump the brine back in the sea when you're no longer desalinating.
And for maximum ecological efficiency that could be powered by solar panels.
I wonder how maintenance free you could build such a device, and just leave it to work away by itself for months on end.
Re: Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hey, me too! Never said I didn't. Just that it's nice to leave some parts of the world to itself.
>> malignant cancer > it's nice come on dude, have some self-awareness
The only thing I was saying is - just because humans can live everywhere doesn't mean we need to.
If you look at any map of the modern world, there is almost nowhere that we haven't transformed into farmland, cities, etc, and it's pretty good (nice) that we have left the uninhabitable islands to nature. We've consumed most of the land, which is both pretty amazing and also quite bad for biodiversity, as everyone knows.
I'm not debating the "cancer" metaphor which is definitely harsh - it has been catastrophic for other life, but great for us. Maybe that wording can be less harsh, but IMO that's not the point.
Re: Simple, solar-powered water desalination (2020)
#170Over a decade ago I saw simple solar stills installed in India with the cascades built of concrete and a glass panel. This was at Maharana Prtap university in Udaipur.
So “proud” of my Alma mater university for developing an exotic technology that uses aerogels and such ... sure, it’s more efficient, but those folks In Udaipur, without a big PR office like MIT’s, built something that could be built by anyone using everyday material.