Applied Thermal Engineering 25 (2005) 27802789

www.elsevier.com/locate/apthermeng

Experimental investigation of an adsorption desalination plant using low-temperature waste heat

Xiaolin Wang, Kim Choon Ng
*

Department of Mechanical Engineering, National University of Singapore, 10 Kent Ridge Crescent, Singapore 119260, Singapore Received 8 December 2004; accepted 10 February 2005 Available online 28 April 2005

Abstract Adsorption cycle is a practical and inexpensive method of desalinating the saline and brackish water to produce potable water for both industrial and residential applications. As compared with the commercial desalination methods, the adsorption technology has the unique advantages such as (i) the utilization of the low-temperature waste heat, (ii) low corrosion and fouling rates on the tube materials due to the lowtemperature evaporation of saline water, (iii) and it has almost no major moving parts which renders inherently low maintenance cost. In addition, the adsorption cycle oers two important benets that are not available to the existing desalination technologies; namely, (i) a two-prong phenomenal barrier to any bio-contamination during the water generation process as compared with existing methods and (ii) the reduction in global warming due to the utilization of low-temperature waste heat which otherwise would have been purged to the atmosphere. This paper describes an experimental investigation and the specic water yields from a four-bed adsorption desalination plant is presented with respect to major assorted coolant and feed conditions. 2005 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
Keywords: Desalination; Adsorption process; Silica gelwater; Specic water yield

Corresponding author. Tel.: +65 68742214. E-mail address: mpengkc@nus.edu.sg (K.C. Ng).

1359-4311/$ - see front matter 2005 Published by Elsevier Ltd. doi:10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2005.02.011

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1. Introduction Desalination has been a practical solution to the water shortage problems encountered in many countries of the world, in particular, in semi-arid regions as well as in countries with high population density. Over the decades, numerous commercial-scale desalination plants have been designed, built and operated, such as (i) the multi-stage ash (MSF) [1,2] type, (ii) the multi-effect desalination [35] type, (iii) the membrane-based reverse osmosis (RO) [6,7] plants. More recent improvements include the hybrid plants, which combine the RO and MSF processes [813], could recover higher quality and yield of water with typical dissolved solids of less than 500 mg/l as required by the World Health Organization (WHO) standards. Ion exchange is another method whereby ions of dissolved inorganic salts are chemically replaced with the more desirable ions, and such a process has been used to minimize the fouling and carry-over to the water. Electro-dialysis (ED) or electro-dialysis reversal (EDR) [14] is deemed as one of the most promising techniques; however, the expected breakthrough has yet been realized. Tonner and Tonner [15] recently summarized the thermal process and analyzed the economics of all those systems. In spite of the incremental improvements of the processes of desalination, which have contribute to the cost eectiveness and a sustainable production of fresh water, the conventional desalination plants are plagued by three major drawbacks [16] and they are (i) the high energy (primary or electricity) consumption of the plant, and the associated environmental emissions, (ii) erosion and blockage of materials of membranes and mass exchangers and (iii) high maintenance costs arising from salt deposition or fouling in the outer surfaces of heat exchangers as well as the corrosion of the tubes. Fouling and corrosion are known to escalate at high solution temperatures and the threshold for high salt deposition from the saline solution is known to occur when temperatures exceed 80 C. Recent development on adsorption desalination cycles is aimed to mitigate the short comings of the conventional desalination methods. The earliest patent related to adsorption-based desalination was reported by Broughton [17], using an ion-retarded resin for the vapor uptake, where a process with a thermally-driven two-bed conguration is simulated. Similar theoretical simulations of adsorption desalination plant were also proposed recently by Zejli et al. [18] and Al-kharabsheh and Goswami [19]. Solar heat source was studied as a heat source for the desalination plant, combined with an open-cycle adsorption heat pump using the Zeolite as the solid-vapor adsorbent. In another example, Richter [20] reported a similar solar-assisted desalination plant comprises an initial desorbed phase during the day and follows by an adsorption phase in the night hours. The long cycle time employed in the simulation yields a high coecient of performance (COP) but being solar-driven, it is weather dependent. In this paper, a unique four-bed adsorption desalination plant that employs a low-temperature waste energy was proposed and experimentally studied. The experimental study was adapted from our previous work on a four-bed, regenerative adsorption chiller [21,22]. The specic water yield is measured experimentally with respect to the key controlling parameters such as heat source temperatures, coolant temperatures, system switching and half-cycle operational times.

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2. Experimental facility Fig. 1 shows a pictorial view of our experimental adsorption desalination plant that comprises two major sections; namely (i) the rating facility that conditioned the temperatures of the heat source and cooling water, and (ii) the adsorption water production system where saline or brackish water is desalinated. Fluctuations of the test condition, due either to system perturbations or to the external environment changes, would be dampened by the purposed built rating facility. The experimental set-up of the saline water desalination system, as shown in Fig. 2, provides a detailed ow diagram to the various sub-components in the plant. Although the operation scheme of the system is similar to that of the four-bed an adsorption chiller [21,22], the main dierence in the two systems lies in the condensed water where it is removed as pure water using a 10 m high liquid lled tubing or a vacuum pump.

Fig. 1. A pictorial view of the four-bed adsorption desalination plant.

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Fig. 2. Schematic of a four-bed adsorption desalination plant.

The tests are conducted under steady state conditions of the coolant temperatures (hot water source and cooling water source temperatures) which are accurately conditioned by the rating facility and hence, the test facility is weather independent. The cooling water, returning from the beds undergoing the adsorption processes and the condenser, is rst mixed in a cooling water storage tank to minimize its temperature uctuations and secondly, it is pumped serially through the cooling tower and an evaporator coil of a mechanical chiller, dropping the coolant temperature to a level below that of the set-point temperature of the heater controller. In the heater tank of the rating facility, the cooling water temperature is now ne-tuned by an electrical heat input using a cascaded two-loop PID controller. Excellent control of the outlet water temperatures is achieved by this control arrangement as the time constant of electrical heating is faster than that of the cooling process of the cooling tower and the mechanical chiller. The control strategy of the hot water is also similar to that of the cold water loop where a hot water storage tank is used to damp any temperature uctuation of the hot water returning from the desorption processes. The hot water from the mixed tank is then fed into the hot water heater tank where its temperature is also ne-tuned by the electrical heat input with a similar PID controller. Similar to the hot water circuit, the evaporator in the adsorption plant is maintained by a constant chilled water return which is electrically controlled at the chilled water heater tank. This heater also simulates the cooling load. All the above-mentioned circuits have a controlled accuracy of 0.3 C.

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In the adsorption desalination plant, the saline water, which is fed to the evaporator, is evaporated by the thermal load supplied by the circulating chilled water loop. The process of vapor uptake is maintained by the adsorbent in the designated adsorption processes and the heat generated in the process is removed by the circulating cool water. Concomitantly, hot water supplied to the desorption beds drives the vapor out and is condensed in the condenser to produce the pure water which is collected in a collection tank and intermittently pumped out to the ambient by a condensate pump. It is noted in the adsorption desalination cycle, the saline water is kept in the evaporator where the evaporation occurs at low temperatures, typically less than 25 C. Hence, the corrosion and fouling rates, caused by the presence of salts in the solution, on the external surfaces of heat exchanger is substantially lowered. Only the evaporator of the plant would be fabricated of stainless steel to withstand the corrosion of the saline or brackish water whilst other components require only mild steel. A saline concentration controller is used to control the level of the saline or brackish water feed in the evaporator and it is noted that the evaporator operates continuously despite the batch cycle for the adsorption and desorption beds. The water production in this experiment was measured using a ow meter. All temperature measurements employs the 5 kX type thermistors with a 3 s time constant (0.2 C, YSI) that each sensor captures accurately the transient swings during the switching period (either pre-heating or -cooling of beds). Otherwise, signicant cumulative error may be introduced if a sluggish temperature sensor is used. Electromagnetic ow transmitters for our ow rate measurements (0.5% of reading + 0.05 l/min, Krohne) are used and the absolute pressure sensors with an accuracy of 3.5% of the reading are also employed. Energy balance of the individual component inside the adsorption desalination plant can be calculated from the following equations. The instantaneous energy input dQhot to the desorption beds and the heat released dQrel during the desorption process could be respectively expressed as _ dQhot mhot C p t T hot-in T hot-out dQrel dqt Dads H 1 2

_ where mhot , hot water ow rate to the beds. Cp(t), specic heat at instantaneous temperature. Thot-in, Thot-out, hot water temperatures at system inlet and outlet, respectively. DadsH is the heats of adsorption and dq(t) represents instantaneous desorbed vapor amount which is determined by the linear driving force equation as dqt 15Dso eEa =RT q q R2 p 3

where Dso, Ea, Rp are constants and R is the gas constant. q is the adsorbate amount inside the bed. The saturated vapor uptake q*, at a given P and T, is calculated by the Toth equation, K expDads H=RT P q t 1=t 1 K 0 =qm expDads H =RT P where qm is the maximum adsorption amount and K0, t are Toth constant. 4

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The Eqs. (1) and (2) are also used to calculate the instantaneous energy rejection dQcooling and heat dQgen generated in the adsorption process in the adsorber respectively. All the parameters must be replaced with cooling water parameters as shown _ dQcooling mcooling C p t T cooling-in T cooling-out dQgen dqt Dads H 5 6

dq(t) is computed using Eqs. (3) and (4), noting that the pressure and temperature must be replaced with the parameter of the adsorber. The cooling capacity, dQevap, is calculated according to the chilled water inlet/outlet tempera_ tures, Tchilled-in, Tchilled-out and chilled water ow rate mchilled _ dQevap mchilled C p t T chilled-in T chilled-out 7 Over a period of a day, the specic water production, SWP is estimated from the measurement of the cooling capacity at the evaporator as Z 3600dQevap 8 hr=msg dt SWP hfg T evap where hr is the working hours per day and hfg is the latent heat of water at the evaporating temperature Tevap. msg is the amount of the silica gel in the system. The energy conversion eciency (COP) dened here is R dQevap dt 9 COP R dQhot dt

3. Results and discussion Presently, there is no available standard rating conditions for the testing of adsorption desalination plants. Based on the test experience carried out in adsorption cycles as well as for a fair comparison of performance, it is proposed that the adsorption desalination plants are to be tested at the following rating conditions: (i) The inlet temperatures of hot, cooling and chilled water supplied to the beds and heat exchangers of the plant are set at 85 C, 29.4 C and 12.2 C respectively. (ii) The coolant ow rates for the evaporator is 0.0455 l/(s kW), where the kW is based on the maximum cooling capacity across the evaporator. (iii) The cooling water ow rate is set to 2.5 times of the evaporator ow rate, where the ratio of water supplied to the designated adsorption beds and the condenser is 11.5, respectively. (iv) The hot water ow rate supplied to the beds (in series ow conguration) is set to have the same ow rate as that of the evaporator. Based on the above-mentioned rating conditions, the performance of the experimental desalination plant is examined by changing the half-cycle time of the batch cycle, typically from 120 s to

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600 s whilst the switching time is held constant at 40 s. Fig. 3 shows the variation of specic water productions (SWP) and COPs of the adsorption desalination plant at assorted half-cycle time on the abscissa axis. Maximum specied water production of 4.7 kg/kg silica gel occurs at an operating cycle time of 180 s, whilst increasing the half-cycle time of the adsorption cycle leads to its reduction. Owing to the increasing trend of COP, a practical half-cycle time for the desalination plant is about 250 s without sacricing much of the SWP yield. The increasing trend of COP is partially attributed to maximization of adsorbent potential and the asymptotic reduction of the temperature dierence between the heat source and the adsorbent when the cycle time is lengthened. Fig. 4 shows the eects of the cooling and chilled water temperature on the SWP and the COP of the desalination plant. It is observed that the SWP is sensitive to both cooling and chilled water temperatures: for example, a drop of 1.6 C could increase the SWP by as much as 10% or a rise in the chilled water temperature of 1.8 C would have the same eect. However, the eect of the water temperatures on the COP is lesser typically about 3% (also within the same order of magnitude of experimental uncertainty) for the above-mentioned temperature changes. This implies that increasing the chilled water temperature to improve SWP is a realistic proposition. Furthermore, if the chilled water is used to further cool the cooling water circuit, further enhancement of the SWP is possible. The eect of the heat source temperature on the desalination plant performance has been demonstrated in the Fig. 5 with two half-cycle times of 180 s and 300 s. It is observed that both SWP and COP increase with increasing heat source temperatures but the system COP is substantially more sensitive with the heat source temperature. Water production from the desalination plant could still function at very low-temperature waste heat such as 65 C into the useful water production and this is the unique feature of the plant. From these tests, it is obvious that the COP of a desalination plant is obstinately low, about 0.38, but it could be improved using a passive heat recovery scheme for the adsorption/desorption beds. The detailed energy recovery schemes have been reported in a recent publication [23] where

5.0

0.40

Specific daily water prodcution, kg/kg silica gel

0.36 4.5

0.32 4.0 0.28

3.5 0.24

3.0 50

150

250

350

450

550

650

0.20

Cycle time, s

Fig. 3. Performance of the four-bed adsorption desalination system under standard operation condition.

COP

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5.0
0.40

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Specific daily water production, kg/kg silicagel

4.5

0.36

4.0

0.32

3.5

0.28

T h=85 oC, T c =31 oC, Tch =1 2.2 oC

3.0

T h=85 C, T c =29.4 C, Tch =12.2 C T h=85 C, T c=31 C, Tch =14 C

2.5 50 150 250 350 450 550
o o o

0.24

Error bar
0.20

650

Cycle time, s

Fig. 4. Eects of the cooling water temperature and chilled water temperature on the system performance.

5.5

0.5 water production at 180s COP at180s water production at 300s COP at 300s

Specific daily water production, kg/kg silica gel

4.5
0.4

3.5

2.5
0.3

1.5

0.5 60 65 70

0.2

Temperature, oC

75

80

85

90

Fig. 5. Eects of the hot water temperature on the system performance.

the timing for the water valves, controlling the cold and hot water that emanate from the beds, are switched in a manner such that their respective hot and cold fronts are correctly directed to the hot or cold water mixing tanks, eliminating any unnecessary temperature uctuation in these tanks. The temperature proles before and after the activation of passive heat recovery are shown in the Fig. 6. The shaded areas bounded by these temperatures represent the portion of energy saved, typically up to 26% of the original heat input and a reduction in the energy rejection. The corresponding COP improvement due to heat recovery scheme is shown in the Fig. 7, and an improvement from 0.34 to 0.43 has been attained by such a scheme.

COP

COP

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90 85 80 75 70

Temperature, C

65 60 55 50 45 40 35 30 25 0 50 100 150 200 250 Time, s 300 350 400 450 500
Reduction of energy rejection Input energy saving

Fig. 6. Temperature prole of the system hot and cooling water under standard operation scheme and passive heat recovery scheme. (h) Hot water inlet temperature using two dierent operation schemes. (m) Hot water outlet temperature using standard operation scheme. (j) Hot water outlet temperature using passive heat recovery scheme. () Cooling water inlet temperature using two dierent operation schemes. () Cooling water outlet temperature using passive heat recovery scheme. (n) Cooling water outlet temperature using standard operation scheme.

0.60 0.55 0.50 0.45

5.1

4.8

4.5

COP

4.2 0.40 3.9 0.35 3.6 0.30 0.25 0.20 110 3.3

3.0 150 190 230 270 310

Cycle time, s

Fig. 7. Comparison of the system performance under two dierent operation schemes.

4. Conclusions An adsorption desalination plant has been investigated using a four-bed regeneration scheme. Based on the proposed standard rating conditions, the optimal specic daily water production (SWP) of 4.7 kg/kg silica gel has been obtained. The SWP yield from the plant may be further boosted up by adopting a higher chilled water temperature supply to the evaporator and a lower cooling water temperature to the designated adsorption beds. It has been demonstrated that the desalination plant is also functional when the heat source temperature is lowered to 65 C. The

Specific daily water production, kg/kg silicagel

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other controlling parameter, namely, the switching time has been optimally determined at 40 s. It has been found that by simple implementation of the valve timing delay (with no hardware alteration) during the switching interval, a passive heat recovery scheme improves the COP by a signicant margin. Lastly, it is emphasized that an adsorption desalination plant guarantees no possibility of bio-contamination in the potable water and this is attributed to the both the evaporative and desorption processes of the adsorption cycle.

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