Desalination Technologies: Overview

Recently, global environmental impacts and rapid population growth have raised concerns in using desalination to produce freshwater. Desalination is the main source of drinkable water in many of highly solar exposed countries such as UAE. Water desalination is expensive, energy intensive and most plants are powered by conventional energy sources that causes harm to the environment. Thus, integrating renewable energy sources with various desalination technologies is appealing. This paper explores some of desalination technologies (RO, MSF, MED) in addition to renewable sources (solar technologies, geothermal, ocean) and how both combined can represent a sustainable solution to resolve water scarcity issue of the globe.