Thermal Performance of MED-TVC Pilot at 95°C Elevated Temperature with Acid-anti-scalant Blend Treatment

Enhancing the efficiency of desalination plants and economics of desalinated water are the major goal to researchers. In desalination industry; Multi Effect Desalination (MED) has an economic potential which proves its maturity among different desalination technologies. Large MED plants were built and operated with satisfactory performance in the last decade. They have been operated at low temperature compared to MSF and competitive operation efficiency. The Desalination Technology Research Institute (DTRI) which belongs to the Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC) of Saudi Arabia has tested MED pilot plant with hybrid acid and anti-scalant treatment to control the scale. The test was conducted under 95 °C compared to 65 TBT which the current commercial standard operational temperature and previously tested 85 TBT within DTRI-SWCC pilot plant. Increase in the TBT would allow to increase the number of effects which lead to more system efficiency (the performance ratio) and then reduce fuel consumption which reflected in water unit cost of the desalinated water. The results showed that the thermal performance including fouling factor and performance ratio was constant and have very minor degradation during the test. The good thermal performance was confirmed by the post-operation visual inspection, which revealed that the heat transfer tubes were maintained in a clean condition after testing.