The EERES4WATER project generates its first scientific publications fruit of the work of the ITC and the US partners
Within the framework of the EERES4WATER project, two scientific articles signed by the Canary Islands Technological Institute (ITC) and the University of Seville (US) have been accepted in the “Desalination and Water Treatment” journal.
The first one, entitled “Configurations of reverse osmosis with variable energy consumption for off-grid wind-powered seawater desalination: system modeling and water cost" and signed by Vicente J. Subiela, Baltasar Peñate and Lourdes García-Rodríguez, presents a technical and economic assessment of wind-powered seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) systems to identify the best combination of coupling between wind power and demanded power for a 5,000 m3/d SWRO unit. Three situations have been studied: Reference or Case 0) SWRO plant operating at the nominal point all of the time; Case 1) SWRO plant operating with variable power demand (up to 67% of the nominal point) by reducing the rotation speed of the high pressure pump, and Case 2) use of a modular SWRO plant, able to operate at four different values of power consumption by means of configuring two units of 1,250 m3/d and a unit of 2,500 m3/d. Power and fresh water production are calculated through a year based on experimental data of wind availability with time steps of 1 h. A comparative techno-economic analysis is performed to identify the best configurations along with recommendations on nominal values of desalination capacity and battery capacity in relation to the nominal power of the wind turbine installed. (doi:10.5004/dwt.2020.24991).
In the second one, the same authors present under the title " Design recommendations and cost assessment for non-stop off-grid plants of seawater desalination based on PV-driven with wind/diesel energy backup", an off-grid multi-generation model (solar photovoltaic, wind power, and diesel) to assess the performance of a low scale (up to 250 m3/d) seawater reverse osmosis desalination plant with four different operating modes: fix, variable (180–250 m3/d), modular-fix (100 + 150 m3/d) and modular-variable operation (100 + 115–150 m3/d). The high-pressure pump and energy recovery system have been selectedfor each case according to the flow requirements; reverse osmosis membrane simulations have been made to know the power demand, product water flow and quality for the whole operating range of each option. The use of real solar and wind data allows to preliminarily assess the performance of the system. A specific battery charge/discharge strategy has been considered to take maximum advantage of wind and solar available energies. The most relevant technical and economic results have been presented, finding out the pros and cons of the different analyzed cases. A sensitivity analysis complements the study to identify the key parameter values addressed to achieve a minimum water cost under 2.2 €/m3. A new index is proposed to assess the performance of the whole system (doi: 10.5004/dwt.2020.25091).
EERES4WATER project (co-financed by the Interreg Atlantic Area Programme through the European Regional Development Fund) aims to provide Atlantic Area stakeholders with the tools and instruments needed to overcome the Energy-Water nexus challenges and increase its utilisation. More information about EERES4WATER project in: https://www.eeres4water.eu
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