TITLE:
A Cost-Effective Wind Power-Driven RO Plant for Treatment of Brackish Water
AUTHORS:
Shivendra Verma, Ramsingh Meena, Anurag Mudgal
KEYWORDS:
Wind Power, Reverse Osmosis, Desalination
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Geoscience and Environment Protection,
Vol.3 No.10,
December
18,
2015
ABSTRACT: Desalination has often been
perceived as a high cost means of producing water. Reason being that some of
the water treatment methods use electricity to run a pump as in Reverse Osmosis
system and some uses thermal energy to produce steam as in Multi Effect
Distillation. High cost and less availability of conventional fuels has
attracted the focus of researchers to explore other unconventional means and
methods to purify water. This paper explores the possibility of using wind
power for water treatment. In costal countries, tremendous wind power is
available at the coastline which may be used to drive a RO plant. In India
particularly, the average wind speed calculated along the coastlines of Gujarat
state gives a fair idea about potential of energy that can be generated. This
energy can be harnessed to run a rotating pump, or a piston-cylinder
arrangement coupled with RO module to provide the necessary pressure required
to push saline water through the membrane. Along the western coast of India
there is an abundance of wind energy to capitulate high amount of energy in
terms of electrical Power. If the rotor diameter is 4 feet (1.3 m) and located
at a height of 8 feet (2.5 m), each wind turbine may produce power of around 2
KW. This power may be used to run the reciprocating pump which provides
pressure to the RO Apparatus. The paper describes recent advancements in the
wind industries technology to produce electrical energy at low cost but it
concentrates more on coupling wind energy directly with RO module to save
energy conversion cost which is a seldom or different approach than converting
electrical energy to mechanical energy for running of RO system.