Desalination

Desalination, also called desalting, removal of dissolved salts from seawater and in some cases from the brackish waters of inland seas, highly mineralized groundwaters, and municipal wastewaters. This process renders such otherwise unusable waters fit for human consumption, irrigation, industrial applications, and various other purposes. Existing desalination technology requires a substantial amount of energy, usually in the form of fossil fuels, and so the process is expensive. For this reason it is generally used only where sources of fresh water are not economically available. In addition, the amount of greenhouse gas emissions and brine wastewater generated by desalination plants pose significant environmental challenges. Desalination methods can utilize either thermal processes or membrane processes. Multistage flash distillation is a thermal process for desalting relatively large quantities of seawater. Based on the fact that the boiling temperature of water is lowered as air pressure drops, this process is carried out in a series of closed tanks set at progressively lower pressures. When preheated seawater enters the first stage, some of it rapidly boils, forming vapour that is condensed into fresh water on heat-exchange tubes. Fresh water is collected in trays as the remaining seawater flows into the next stage, where it also flashes, and the process is continued.

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