I-Corps: Solar Thermal Membrane Distillation System

Award ID: 1929972

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is to provide an affordable solution to safe drinking water for the people living in water-stressed areas. There are over 1 billion people living under physical scarcity of water and another 1.6 billion people facing economic water scarcity. In addition, people who suffer from water system breakdown by natural disasters, who live in water-contaminated areas or who need to survive in remote undeveloped areas would also benefit from the commercialization of the technology. This technology could also be used as part of the survival equipment for military operation, oil and gas drilling workers, and life rafts used in ships and aircraft. From the technical point of view, the invented system could open a new research area in the field of point-of-use water system given its innovative design in utilizing solar thermal energy, high energy efficiency in extracting clean potable water with low capital and maintenance costs. This I-Corps project is a novel solar thermal membrane distillation system which is capable of utilizing solar thermal energy to produce potable water from untreated surface water, wastewater, and seawater, without using any electrical devices. The main novelty of the novel solar thermal membrane distillation system lies in its innovative mechanism of localizing the solar thermal energy at the air-water interface for highly efficient evaporation of interfacial water molecules without losing much heat to the bulk feed water. Thus, the production rate of distilled water per unit area of solar heat collector is higher than most conventional solar thermal membrane distillation systems and the solar stills on the market. Another novelty is the simplicity in the design of the invented system. It is the first membrane distillation system that does not require any electrical devices, such as pumps and photovoltaic cells. Thus, the capital and maintenance costs of the invented system can be lower than conventional and other existing solar thermal membrane distillation systems for the same production rate of distilled water. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

NSF Program Director: Ruth Shuman