Sustainable solutions for brackish water desalination: a comprehensive investigation into reverse osmosis efficiency enhancement

Desalination of brackish and saltwater is one of the most important freshwater resources in water stressed regions. The reverse osmosis process is an efficient and successful water desalination technology that requires a significant amount of electrical power and accordingly, it prevents the diffusion of this technology worldwide. The objective of this study is to reduce energy consumption in a Moroccan brackish water reverse osmosis desalination plant. Currently, this plant operates without energy recovery and the production rate reaches 1,017 m3/h with a maximum SEC of 3.2 kWh/m3. The organisation plans to increase production rates by adding more reverse osmosis trains which has a direct impact on the SEC. This study aims to optimise SEC through this plant in its future design. Both configurations with and without ERD were simulated to analyse the variation of SEC using a range of feed water parameter fluctuations, particularly its temperature and salinity. The results showed that the implementation of ERD in the future design will reduce the SEC by 30%.