Page - 171 - in Clean Water Using Solar and Wind - Outside the Power Grid

Water operations using renewables – some cases 171 Example 14.11: Texas, U.S. Another example of wind-powered desalination is from Texas, U.S. (Swift et al., 2009) in a region suffering from severe water scarcity and depending on deep high-salinity aquifers. RO treatment of this kind of brackish water is a realistic and economically feasible solution. There is not only high salinity (around 2600 mg/l of total dissolved solids); arsenic and fluoride concentrations are also high. RO technology would lower these to acceptable limits. A feasibility study has been made for a municipal, integrated wind-water desalination system for an inland small community. The study from Texas demonstrates that the integration of the two relatively mature technologies of wind energy and RO becomes an attractive option for addressing an emerging threat to any region heavily dependent on affordable energy and potable water. In the Texas study a small 5 kW wind turbine provided the energy for an RO desalination plant with the capacity of about 6 m3/day. The energy requirement was found to be around 0.82 kWh/m3 of treated water. The Swift report gives a detailed account of not only wind power supply but also operating and maintenance experiences of desalination facilities. 14.4 FURTHER READING ON DESALINATION AND RENEWABLE ENERGY There is a lot of literature and information concerning desalination using renewable energy. Some useful sources are: • Desalination journal (Elsevier); • Elemental Water Makers, a Dutch start-up company offering desalination using renewable energy (www.elementalwatermakers. com); • Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE (www.ise. fraunhofer.de); • Lenntech, a company offering solutions for desalination systems (www.lenntech.com); • EIP Water (The European Innovation Partnership on Water): an initiative within the EU 2020 Innovation Union. The EIP Water facilitates the development of innovative solutions to address major European and global water challenges (www.eip-water.eu). Downloaded from https://iwaponline.com/ebooks/book-pdf/520710/wio9781780409443.pdf by IWA Publishing user