干旱区生态环境知识资源中心

This work presents the process design and operational performance of a small-scale solar-driven dual-purpose plant to generate electricity and produce desalinated freshwater. The plant consists of a hybrid desalination system of reverse osmosis (RO) and a vacuum multi-effect membrane distillation (V-MEMD), coupled with a solar linear Fresnel collector (LFC) and a turbo-generator system. The integrated system is designed to provide the optimum solution for big desert farms of high ground-water salinity (of 15,000 ppm and more). The RO is designed with 40% recovery and its brine is used to feed V-MEMD units of almost the same recovery of around 40%. The system (base case) is designed with turbo-generator to provide the plant and the farm with electrical power (rating 68 kW) while the hybrid desalination plant is designed with 617 m(3)/d capacity. Other scale up designs for electricity and water production will also be highlighted. The technical analysis of the dual-purpose system will be presented including; the plant specifications, process design and components sizing parameters of hybrid desalination plant and solar LFC.