Humidification-dehumidification desalination process driven by photovoltaic thermal energy recovery (PV-HDH) for small-scale sustainable water and power production

Humidification-dehumidification (HDH) desalination technology with the use of recovered photovoltaic (PV) thermal energy could be viable for the production of small-capacity sustainable water and improvement of PV electric power generation efficiency. This paper investigates the technical feasibility and environmental friendliness of an air-cooled PV system integrated with ambient seawater inflow into a HDH desalination system. The technical analysis of the PV-HDH desalination process was carried out through the modeling of the physical and thermodynamic properties involved in the recovery of PV thermal energy and determination of the effect of this recovery on water produced under the environmental conditions of Abu Dhabi, UAE. The results showed that the heat recovered from the PV resulted in the production of a daily average of 2.28 L of fresh water per m2 of PV. On the other hand, the environmental impact assessment of this PV-HDH power and desalination technology was also carried out for the first time in order to determine its viability for small-scale sustainable water and energy production. The PV-HDH system resulted in 83.6% decrease in environmental impacts when compared with PV-Reverse Osmosis (PV-RO) system. In conclusion, the integrated PV-HDH desalination technology is promising and expected to play a key role in the field of water desalination.