Treatment of Sea Water Using Solar Desalination (Distillation Process) &ndash; An Alternative Source of Potable Water

Lorraine  A. Carillo,; Nolan  C. Tolosa,

Treatment of Sea Water Using Solar Desalination (Distillation Process) – An Alternative Source of Potable Water

Abstract:

Desalination is a process that removes salt and other dissolved contaminants in saline water. A development in the field of fresh water technology system today for portability purposes includes processes, which are highly expensive process. Thus, there is a need to develop a new desalination system that is economical and easy to operate. This paper investigates the use of desalination process to generate potable water from saltwater using distillation set-up.

The water desalination technique was developed to reduce and eventually eliminate pollutants such as total and fecal coliforms, chloride, etc. It also aims to produce fresh water from sea by direct sunlight that can supply the whole family in an island and coastal community. The set-up was designed using flexi glass with gutter at the sides for collection purposes to determine the pathogen (total and fecal coliforms) and chloride reduction in the salt water feed.

This set-up had the capacity if disinfecting contaminated water, i.e. total and fecal coliforms values of <1.1 MPN/100 ml and reduction of chlorides (99 – 100%) that contribute to the salinity of the water. The optimum volume and temperature of the water achieved for an 8-hr exposure ranges from 354 – 3, 185 mL per day and 36 – 65.1°C, respectively. This study proved that the set-up is possible to desalinate and disinfect salt water.