CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the study

Many people in the world are suffering from a shortage of sanitary fresh water for

drinking and cooking. To solve the problem, large scale desalination plants, such as RO and

MSF, have been constructed in many countries. However, many people who live in remote

areas do not have access to fresh water from such plants. Therefore, solar stills, in which

saline water is evaporated by solar energy and water vapor is condensed to get sanitary fresh

water, have been widely studied in order to supply drinking water to such areas. Solar stills

have a simple structure and are usually designed so that they are able to be constructed

using locally available materials. However, the productivity of solar stills is generally very

small since the energy density of solar energy is very small compared to other energy

sources such as fuel or electricity. This may be one of the biggest disadvantages of the solar

stills.

People who cannot access a water infrastructure also often use biomass energy,

such as wood or agricultural residues, for cooking. In fact, about half the world’s

population relies on biomass energy for cooking. Therefore, it would be attractive to make

a device which can supply sanitary fresh water by utilizing a part of the thermal energy of

biomass burned during cooking.

Rajan et al. proposed a basin type solar still integrated with a biomass boiler. Biomass was

burned in the boiler and the thermal energy was used to heat up saline water in the basin. It

was found that the distillate productivity of the still can be increased by integrating it with the

biomass boiler

In this paper, a thermal distillation system utilizing a part of thermal energy of

biomass burned in the stove by means of a heat pipe is introduced. Saline or muddy water

can be treated with the thermal distillation system. A pilot experimental apparatus was
constructed and the experiments were per- formed with single-effect and multiple-effect

distillers to investigate whether the heat pipe can transport thermal energy adequately from

the stove to the distiller and fresh water can be obtained by the thermal distillation system.

Here, it should be noted that thermal energy of the biomass burned in the stove is used

primarily for cooking, and the distiller uses a part of the energy to distill water.

1.2 Statement of the problem

As mentioned before, the most efficient processes to purify water use electricity,

and represent high costs of production and maintenance. The region of La Guajira is

mostly populated by low-income indigenous people, the development of this system of

desalination has to consider their characteristics and daily life conditions. Thus, it should

be designed to cater their needs and implement a process of desalination in a

sustainable and inexpensive manner to obtain sufficient amounts of drinkable water.

Communities in La Guajira Colombia, have an abundant source of water from the

Caribbean ocean. However, it cannot be used for human consumption due to its high

levels of salt. In addition, biomass heat energy is a plentiful source of energy in the

country, taking advantage of it by implementing a desalination system can significantly

reduce the cost of obtaining clean water.

1.3 Objective of Study

The primary objective of this research work is to optimally design and fabricate a

biomass energy desalination system for an average family in villages. The work involves

designing and fabricating various parts of this desalination system including a

concentrator, an absorber and a condenser and pipes. The following issues have been

addressed in this study.

• To design and optimize an absorber by considering factors like salinity of water,

temperature and pressure conditions and by using theoretical and experimental analysis.

• To design and optimize a condenser by considering factors like heat loss using

theoretical, experimental and CFD analysis.

• To test and validate the system at different times and for different quantities of water.

• To develop a mathematical model of a system for finding the rate of evaporation and

time of operation, for its use in the solar desalination systems.

1.4 Significance of the study

Utilizing Biomass energy will be a boon for economically downtrodden and

people living in remote arid, semiarid regions. Availability of biomass heat energy

is abundant which can be trapped and coupled with membrane distillation for

potable water applications. The present work throws light on the concept of

integrated approach of renewable energy employed in desalination of different

water resources, proving to be the promising technology in the application of

desalination of water, quenching the thirst of millions of people living in arid and

semi-arid regions.

1.5 Scope of the Study

The study involves design and fabrication of a solar desalination system for a

small family use only in costal and rural areas of India. Further, the study is based on

water collected from the areas which are facing the shortage of drinking water and

electricity.
1.6 Theoretical Framework

In order to understand the forthcoming overview and discussion points of the

project work, the author assesses the importance of explaining the basic notions of

desalination and in more detail, due to its actual relevance and strong future perspective,

reverse osmosis process.

1.7.1 Desalination Process

Desalination is achieved through thermal technology processes and membrane

technology. Thermal processes cover multi-stage flash distillation (MSF) multieffect

distillation (MED) and vapor compression (VC). Membrane processes include electro

dialysis (ED) and reverse osmosis (RO). Both methods get as result two flows: A flow of

clean water with low salt concentration and a flow with high salt concentration. Both

methods require energy for operation. Energy consumption in membrane processes

depends on the feed water salinity whereas in non-thermal processes there is no such

dependence.

Energy consumption in RO and ED processes for brackish waters and low salt

content waters is much lower than in the processes of distillation. In addition, recent

advances in RO technology for seawater desalination have reduced energy

consumption. The most widespread current technique and the one that holds most of the

future projection is reverse osmosis.

Therefore, when choosing either desalination process it is important to know

what kind of water will be treated.

Here is a brief description of the various desalination processes for marine

waters or continental brackish waters:

a) Distillation processes are divided into:

• Thermal Distillation: the energy for the desalination is obtained from fossil fuels (coal,

natural gas, oil, etc.). • Vapor compression: a compressor to get two adiabatic different

sectors of pressure is used to generate a flow of steam from the sector of higher

pressure and condensing temperature to the lower, where condensation occurs.

• Solar distillation: suitable for small communities in arid or semiarid regions. It has two

variants depending on whether the sun's energy is used directly or it’s catched by using

solar cells.
b) Freezing processes: salt water is subjected to various cooling systems to

subsequently evaporate at low pressure in a vacuum crystallizer. This results in ice

crystals mixed with brine crystals that can be separated by mechanical processes. c)

Membrane Processes are widely distributed today. There are two basic types: •

Reverse osmosis: by applying mechanical pressure to counteract the natural osmotic

pressure water flows from the area with higher salt concentration to the lower

concentration area until pure water is achieved.

• Electrodialysis: ion separation through a series of membranes located successively

millimeters apart. The application of electric fields generates the migration of ions that

pass through these membranes that act as sieves.