Improved productivity of seawater desalination systems through humidification–dehumidification process integrated with renewable and fogging technologies in a lowest cost

Abstract Water desalination using renewable energy with a cooling system integrated with a fogging technique has recently made significant advancements. This study investigates the influence of the fogging technique on improving the process of HDH water desalination integrated with a cooling system. An experimental study investigated how operational factors like the mass flow rate ratio, feed water temperature, feed water salinity, cooling water temperature, and nozzle orifice diameter affected the salinity of the produced water, freshwater productivity, and GOR. The fogging system achieves maximum productivity of 25.08 L/h and 25.39 L/h when employing nozzles with orifice sizes of 0.3 mm for feed water salinity levels of 34,000 ppm and 12,000 ppm, respectively. The greatest GOR was achieved by utilizing a nozzle orifice of 0.3 mm, resulting in GOR values of 8.79 and 8.84 for concentrations of 34,000 ppm and 12,000 ppm, respectively. The salinity of the produced water reaches 1500 ppm and 500 ppm when the fog is created at a temperature of 80 °C, with feed water salinity levels of 34,000 ppm and 12,000 ppm, respectively. The fogging nozzle’s size directly affects the generated water’s salinity. When the size of the fogging nozzle reduces from 0.3 to 0.1 mm, the salinity decreases by about 34.8% and 33.3% for 34,000 ppm and 12,000 ppm, respectively. This pattern indicates that the water’s salinity decreases as the nozzle’s diameter decreases. Nevertheless, under identical circumstances, water productivity declined by 56% and 55% at 34,000 ppm and 12,000 ppm, respectively. The water production cost was 0.0268–0.0088 ($/liter). The study concludes that the salinity of the generated water reduces as the feed water temperature increases and the nozzle size decreases. In contrast, water productivity, GOR, and lower cost are enhanced using a larger nozzle.