Tailoring polymerized fabrics for sustainable water-driven electricity and salt-water separation membrane

Abstract

Harnessing energy and freshwater from natural water sources, offers a viable approach to addressing the dual challenges of energy and water scarcity. However, it is essential to develop an effective and balanced water supply for water-driven electricity generation and high-rate salt-water separation in the solar steam generation process. Herein, hybrid hydropower and photo-thermal systems are developed by in-situ polymerization of pyrrole (Py) on non-woven fabric (NF) as energy generators and high-rate salt-water separators. The in-situ polymerized non-woven fabric (PPy-NF) exhibites an voltage of ∼0.59 V and a current of ∼18 μA by dropping 20 μL NaCl solution (3 wt%). The detailed investigations indicate that the polymerization degree of Py, water content and ions play important roles in energy output performance. In addition, a PPy-NF based solar evaporation system is constructed and equipped with a unidirectional water supply and air insulation gap for concurrent water evaporation with a rate of ∼2.5 kg m⁻² h⁻¹ under standard solar irradiance conditions (1 kW m⁻²) while the crystalline salt is discharged at one end. More importantly, the generated power output is expected to evaporate water to address the issue of insufficient evaporation rate caused by intermittent sunlight. This work demonstrates the structural configuration of multifunctional hybrid solar-driven evaporation systems, which contributes to address effective strategies for energy and water scarcity issues.