Fresh Water from Saline Waters

Book excerpt: Fresh Water from Saline Waters: The Political, Social, Engineering and Economic Aspects of Desalination examines the political, social, engineering and economic aspects of desalination, with emphasis on the recovery of fresh water from saline waters. The feasibility of combining power generation and distillation is discussed. This book begins with an overview of the history and some basic concepts of desalination, a process that involves artificially taking away or removing the salt from salted water or from sea water. It then presents a brief overall perspective on water supply and its uses in the United States, along with an explanation of the technical principles of distillation with particular reference to evaporation, freezing, and electrodialysis. The desalination process known as multi-stage flash distillation is also considered, together with the principles of combining power generation and distillation and the thermodynamic basis of this integration. The book concludes with an analysis of the economics of nuclear power plants and nuclear heat for distillation. This monograph will be useful for undergraduate students, practitioners, and researchers in engineering, economics, politics, and social sciences.