Design and fabrication of an efficient solar powered desalination system for remote communities

Solar desalination is a viable solution to freshwater scarcity in remote and off-grid communities that do not have centralized infrastructure. In this work, the design, performance, and evaluation of an autonomous photovoltaic (PV)-battery-reverse osmosis (RO)-water tank desalination system is presented using simulation. The system is modeled in the MATLAB software at an hourly resolution for one complete year (8760h) with realistic climatic data from the POWER (Power System Energy) database at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Physically consistent models are applied to PV generation, battery energy-power behavior, RO specific energy consumption, and freshwater-storage dynamics. Baseline results indicate a community demand of 10 m3/day can be met with 98.63% daily reliability, which results in 3643.73 m3/year of desalinated water and 0.319% unmet demand with a realized SEC of 4.74 kWh/m3. However, only 56.43% of available PV-bus energy is utilized, indicating a considerable PV-curtailment. The outcome of phase 2 indicates that a decrease in the levelized cost of water (LCOW) through a relaxation of reliability to a 95% daily reliability, without compromising on acceptable service levels, is possible. Demand sensitivity, design space exploration, and dispatch policy comparison reveal the great potential of curtailment-aware operation in conjunction with sufficient water storage to enhance system efficiency and economic performance for remote desalination applications.