Advances in Membrane Distillation for Water Desalination and Purification Applications

CATEGORY: DESALINATION
Water 2013, 5, 94-196; doi:10.3390/w5010094
Advances in Membrane Distillation for Water Desalination and Purification Applications
Lucy Mar Camacho 1,*, Ludovic Dumée 2,3, Jianhua Zhang 3, Jun-de Li 4, Mikel Duke 3, Juan Gomez 5 and Stephen Gray 3,*
ludovic.dumee@deakin.edu.au
jianhua.zhang@vu.edu.au
mikel.duke@vu.edu.au
jun-de.li@vu.edu.au
juan.gomez@utsa.edu
stephen.gray@vu.edu.au
lcamacho3@utep.edu
1 Center for Inland Desalination Systems, University of Texas at El Paso, 500 West University Avenue, El Paso, TX 79968, USA
2 Institute for Frontier Materials, Deakin University, Waurn Ponds Campus, Victoria 3216, Australia
3 Institute for Sustainability and Innovation, Victoria University, P.O. Box 14428, Melbourne, Victoria 8001, Australia
4 School of Engineering and Science, Victoria University, P.O. Box 14428, Melbourne, Victoria 8001, Australia
5 Texas Sustainable Energy Research Institute, University of Texas at San Antonio, 1 UTSA Circle, San Antonio, TX 78249, USA
Abstract
Membrane distillation is a process that utilizes differences in vapor pressure to permeate water through a macro-porous membrane and reject other non-volatile constituents present in the influent water. This review considers the fundamental heat and mass transfer processes in membrane distillation, recent advances in membrane technology, module configurations, and the applications and economics of membrane distillation, and identifies areas that may lead to technological improvements in membrane distillation as well as the application characteristics required for commercial deployment.
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