KII/Suns River has provided D&WR with more information about its extended work at the Brackish Ground Water National Research Facility (BGNDRF) in Alamogordo, New Mexico, during the next several months.
As reported by D&WR on 2 September 2013, the company is one of nine US organizations to share new Bureau of Reclamation funding for its research project.
KII will be using its modular design for solar collection and evaporation, and will also use its zero liquid discharge (ZLD) design for the first time. All this is part of the patented 99%+ solar desalination design Suns River proved at Alamogordo in 2012 (D&WR feature, November/December 2012 issue).
As Suns River moves toward larger scale manufacturing, the company has added a modular approach to building the equipment. Solar units are sized to fit into multi-modal containers for shipment from manufacturing sites to locations around the world.
This design takes advantage of the full volume of standard containers to minimize shipping costs and reduce build-on-site costs. Suns River desalination costs are lower than reverse osmosis, and this step to make manufacturing and shipping more efficient is expected to widen the Suns River cost advantage.
Suns River research has developed techniques to approach ZLD based on the unique nature of its solar desalination process. Preliminary estimates are that the results will be 75% recovery of feed water as pure, distilled water and plus a small volume of solid salt. Key to the Suns River process is that the salt will contain nothing other than the salt which came in with the feed water.
Operating results from the ZLD operation and other operations are expected in early 2014. The entire separation process is powered by renewable solar energy.