A new solar desalination system takes in saltwater and heats it with natural sunlight. The system flushes out accumulated salt, so replacement parts aren’t needed often, meaning the system could potentially produce drinking water that is cheaper than tap water.
Salt is highly corrosive, especially when concentrated into a slurry. If you dump it directly from shore you kill any local wildlife and destroy the local area before it dilutes. If you pipe it further out into the ocean the pipe will continually need maintenance due to corrosion and makes it more expensive
There are a number of alloys that are used when working with desalinization plants, but the effective ones are cost prohibitive.
Even if they had a way of pumping it out cheaper, it still comes with issues that are costly. There are chemicals used during the process which pollute the brine and cost money to remove. It also comes out much warmer than surrounding water which disrupts the ecosystem. The brine eats up oxygen levels and suffocates animal life in the area.
They are trying to dilute the brine before releasing it back to the ocean but this is either not effective enough since you’re using salt water from the same source you’re pumping into, especially if the area doesn’t have strong currents to carry it away. Or you’re using water which doesn’t have high salt levels and can dilute it to healthy levels, which you might as well just treat and use in the first place instead of using saltwater.
Salt is highly corrosive, especially when concentrated into a slurry. If you dump it directly from shore you kill any local wildlife and destroy the local area before it dilutes. If you pipe it further out into the ocean the pipe will continually need maintenance due to corrosion and makes it more expensive
Isn’t that assuming you pipe it out using metal. Would plastic or carbon fibre be viable for this? Or at least coating a metal pipe?
There are a number of alloys that are used when working with desalinization plants, but the effective ones are cost prohibitive.
Even if they had a way of pumping it out cheaper, it still comes with issues that are costly. There are chemicals used during the process which pollute the brine and cost money to remove. It also comes out much warmer than surrounding water which disrupts the ecosystem. The brine eats up oxygen levels and suffocates animal life in the area.
They are trying to dilute the brine before releasing it back to the ocean but this is either not effective enough since you’re using salt water from the same source you’re pumping into, especially if the area doesn’t have strong currents to carry it away. Or you’re using water which doesn’t have high salt levels and can dilute it to healthy levels, which you might as well just treat and use in the first place instead of using saltwater.
It’s not an easy problem to solve at the moment
Fair points. I appreciate the response.