Distillation desalination is one of mankinds earliest forms of water treatment, and it is still a popular treatment solution throughout the world today. Several years ago, more than 00 desalination plants processed 12 billion gallons of water daily. Israel proves the desalination era is here scientific. Thermal methods require a large input of energy to heat the water. Cheap, simple technique turns seawater into drinking water. The pipe is so large i could walk through it standing upright, were it not full of mediterranean seawater pumped from an intake a mile offshore.
The global challenge of sustainable seawater desalination s eawater desalination is here to stay, and not just in historically arid areas such as the middle east, but in many places around the world where rivers used as a water source no longer reach their original destination or have insu. Desalination is a general term for the process that removes dissolved solids and. Desalinationremoving dissolved minerals from seawater, brackish groundwater, or treated wastewaterappears at first glance to be the ideal answer to freshwater shortages. Seawater desalination has the potential to reliably produce enough potable water to support large populations located near the coast. Rightnow, desalinating seawater is the only viable way to provide water togrowing populations, and large desalination plants are now a fact oflife. Seawater desalination is rapidily emerging as one of the major new sources of freshwater for. Three major seawater desalination technologies reverse osmosis 2. Forward osmosis fo is a concentrationdriven process.
Until recently, in desalination treatment plants seawater was pretreated with a combination of conventional techniques such as air flotation, clarification, sand filtration and cartridge. In ancient times, many civilizations used this process on their ships to convert sea water into drinking water. Numerous membrane filtration seawater desalination plants are currently under construction or in the planning stages up and down californias parched coast, with the 50 million gallons per day mgd carlsbad. Membrane methods of desalination require energy for mechanical processes.
Desalination can be defined as any process that removes salts from water. Desalination of water has become a key to helping meet increasing water needs, especially in waterstressed countries where water obtained by desalination far exceeds supplies from the freshwater. Pdf desalination technologies for developing countries. Pdf pretreatment methods for seawater desalination and. Reverse osmosis is the most cost effective in many applications. Cost evaluation for desalination is a difficult process as data are influenced.
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