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A salt-rejecting floating solar still for low-cost desalination

Author(s)
Ni, George Wei; Zandavi, Seyed Hadi; Javid, Seyyed Morteza; Boriskina, Svetlana V; Cooper, Thomas A; Chen, Gang; ... Show more Show less
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Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/
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Abstract
Although desalination technologies have been widely adopted as a means to produce freshwater, many of them require large installations and access to advanced infrastructure. Recently, floating structures for solar evaporation have been proposed, employing the concept of interfacial solar heat localization as a high-efficiency approach to desalination. However, the challenge remains to prevent salt accumulation while simultaneously maintaining heat localization. This paper presents an experimental demonstration of a salt-rejecting evaporation structure that can operate continuously under sunlight to generate clean vapor while floating in a saline body of water such as an ocean. The evaporation structure is coupled with a low-cost polymer film condensation cover to produce freshwater at a rate of 2.5 L m[superscript -2] day[superscript -1], enough to satisfy individual drinking needs. The entire system's material cost is $3 m[superscript -2] -over an order of magnitude lower than conventional solar stills, does not require energy infrastructure, and can provide cheap drinking water to water-stressed and disaster-stricken communities.
Date issued
2018-01
URI
https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/126103
Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering
Journal
Energy & Environmental Science
Publisher
Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)
Citation
Ni, George, et al. "A salt-rejecting floating solar still for low-cost desalination." Energy & Environmental Science, 11 (2018): 1510-1519.
Version: Author's final manuscript
ISSN
1754-5692
1754-5706

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