In recent decades, the growing need for efficient water production and energy supply solutions has coincided with an increased focus on reducing environmental impact, particularly the carbon footprint. As the share of energy generated from renewable sources has increased significantly, the need for short- and long-term storage to manage the mismatch between demand and production has increased. Hydrogen production has great potential especially for long term storage systems, e.g. seasonal storage systems to transfer summer production during winter peak demand, moreover it has the potential to directly cover non electrical energy demand such as the transport one. Hydrogen production requires a significant amount of fresh water, which represents an additional demand compared to traditional sectors such as residential, industrial and agriculture. The production of fresh water could be very critical on the islands, with limited reservoirs in arid climate. Thus, the desalination systems have become essential to meet the growing demand for fresh water and provide water production in remote islands, this study focus on a thermo-economic analysis of two consolidate desalination technologies, namely Reverse Osmosis (RO) and Multi-Stage Flash Distillation (MSF) integrated with a reversible Solid Oxide Cell (SOC) that acts primarily as an energy storage and a photo-catalytic system. The multivector production (i.e. electricity, hydrogen and fresh water) is optimized by the Multi-Energy Dispatch Optimiser (MEDO). The code is based on the Mixed Integer Linear Problem (MILP) approach, and to account for the non-linear operating curve behaviour in off-design conditions for each energy system, the piece-wise linearisation methodology is adopted. Fresh water and hydrogen demand profiles for remote islands are defined, which significantly affect the operational strategy for the desalination plants. A sensitivity analysis is then carried out on the size of the nominal production capacity of the desalination plant, as this has an impact on the total performance of the system. The different design solutions are evaluated based on the Levelised Cost of Water (LCOW), Levelised Cost of Electricity (LCOE) which considers both system investment and operating costs.
STRATEGIES FOR SOLAR-DRIVEN FRESH WATER AND HYDROGEN PRODUCTION IN ISLAND SCENARIOS
Baldinelli A.Funding Acquisition
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2025-01-01
Abstract
In recent decades, the growing need for efficient water production and energy supply solutions has coincided with an increased focus on reducing environmental impact, particularly the carbon footprint. As the share of energy generated from renewable sources has increased significantly, the need for short- and long-term storage to manage the mismatch between demand and production has increased. Hydrogen production has great potential especially for long term storage systems, e.g. seasonal storage systems to transfer summer production during winter peak demand, moreover it has the potential to directly cover non electrical energy demand such as the transport one. Hydrogen production requires a significant amount of fresh water, which represents an additional demand compared to traditional sectors such as residential, industrial and agriculture. The production of fresh water could be very critical on the islands, with limited reservoirs in arid climate. Thus, the desalination systems have become essential to meet the growing demand for fresh water and provide water production in remote islands, this study focus on a thermo-economic analysis of two consolidate desalination technologies, namely Reverse Osmosis (RO) and Multi-Stage Flash Distillation (MSF) integrated with a reversible Solid Oxide Cell (SOC) that acts primarily as an energy storage and a photo-catalytic system. The multivector production (i.e. electricity, hydrogen and fresh water) is optimized by the Multi-Energy Dispatch Optimiser (MEDO). The code is based on the Mixed Integer Linear Problem (MILP) approach, and to account for the non-linear operating curve behaviour in off-design conditions for each energy system, the piece-wise linearisation methodology is adopted. Fresh water and hydrogen demand profiles for remote islands are defined, which significantly affect the operational strategy for the desalination plants. A sensitivity analysis is then carried out on the size of the nominal production capacity of the desalination plant, as this has an impact on the total performance of the system. The different design solutions are evaluated based on the Levelised Cost of Water (LCOW), Levelised Cost of Electricity (LCOE) which considers both system investment and operating costs.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
