Performance assessment of solar adsorption desalination system for sustainable cooling and freshwater maximization

Abstract

Achieving sustainable cooling and freshwater requires high-performance, eco-friendly technology that produces both cooling and desalinated water. This study presents a novel utilization of promising composite adsorbent materials for a solar-powered adsorption cooling and desalination system. The proposed study utilizes silica gel-calcium chloride (SG/CaCl2), as well as sodium polyacrylate-calcium chloride (SP/CaCl2) and Maxsorb-calcium chloride (Max/CaCl2) composites as potential adsorption materials. These adsorbents are employed in the adsorption cycle with and without evaporator-condenser heat recovery, in a four-bed-two-evaporator mode. The system is simulated and validated with previous experimental data. The findings indicate that the SP/CaCl2 (with four beds and two evaporators mode) has the highest freshwater production, at 40.5 m3/ton.day, followed by Max/CaCl2 at 38.6 m3/ton.day, and then SG/CaCl2 at 36.4 m3/ton.day. The system also produces a cooling effect of about 773 W/kg per Max/CaCl2, followed by SG/CaCl2 with 728 W/kg. The study expresses the freshwater cost, indicating the potential of utilizing the proposed configuration (4-beds-two evaporators mode) using these selected adsorbent materials for producing a sustainable cooling effect and freshwater. With waste heat, the levelized freshwater cost falls as low as $0.63 m−3 for SP/CaCl2 and reaches $0.82 m−3 for SG/CaCl2.