Effect of Temperature on Diluate Water in Batch Electrodialysis Reversal

Abstract

A high percentage of the agricultural wells in the state of Sonora are overexploited, thus generating a significant degree of saline intrusion and abandonment by nearby communities. In this paper, the effect of temperature on the final concentration of diluted water was evaluated with variations in voltage and input concentration in a batch electrodialysis reversal (EDR) process in order to find the optimal operating conditions, with an emphasis on reducing the energy consumption and cost of desalinated water. Thirty-six samples were prepared: eighteen samples of 2000 mg/L total dissolved solids (TDS) and eighteen samples of 5000 mg/L TDS; brackish well water of 639 mg/L TDS and synthetic salt were mixed to obtain these concentrations. Three different temperatures (25, 30, and 35 °C) and two different voltages (10 and 20 V) were tested for each sample after evaluating the limiting current density. The best salt removal occurred in the 20 V sets, with 18.34% higher removal for the 2000 mg/L TDS experiments and 25.05% for the 5000 mg/L experiments (average between the 25 to 35 °C tests). The temperature positively affected the EDR, especially in the experiments at 10 V, where increasing by 10 °C increased the efficiency by 10.83% and 24.69% for 2000 and 5000 mg/L TDS, respectively. The energy consumption was lower with increasing temperature (35 °C), as it decreased by 1.405% and 1.613% for the 2000 and 5000 mg/L TDS concentrations, respectively (average between the 10 and 20 V tests), thus decreasing the cost per m3 of water.