干旱区生态环境知识资源中心

The coupling of renewable energy sources (RES) with desalination has the potential of providing a sustainable potable water source, especially in arid areas with limited water resources. During the design stage a RES-desalination process combination suitable for the particular application needs to be selected. The factors that should be considered for such a selection include the local RES potential, the compatibility of the desalination process with a certain renewable energy source, its effectiveness with respect to energy consumption, the amount of fresh water required in combination with the range of applicability of the various desalination processes, the seawater treatment requirements, the capital cost of the equipment, the land area required or could be made available for the installation of the system. The main aim of the present research is to find out how RES can optimally be combined with desalination technologies in small and medium size islands, through the development of a suitable selection methodology. To that effect a multicriteria analysis model is developed with special attention to the selection of the evaluation criteria and the weighting factors of these criteria in the final evaluation of the various alternative combinations of RES with desalination technologies. The criteria include technological, environmental, economic and location specific aspects of each alternative desalination-RES application scenario.