SBIR Phase I: Novel Cryodesalination System

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) project allows energy efficiencies and novel methods of fresh water production. The high cost of conventional methods prevent construction of new desalination (converting salt water) and wastewater clean-up facilities. The proposed project lowers the high capital and operating costs of producing fresh water. The proposed process is a platform technology with applications ranging from seawater desalination to purification of waste streams from a variety of industries, including petroleum, mining, fertilizer, and coal. The units can range in size from small mobile units on skids to massive high-volume infrastructure plants enabling economies of scale and construction of large plants, potentially at one-tenth the costs of present-day desalination plants. This SBIR Phase I project proposes to prove and quantify the effectiveness of two major innovations: the crystallizer that controls crystal size and the ice-brine separation process which separates ice crystals from residual brine without mechanical equipment. The crystallizer R&D includes calibrating and measuring internal circulation; charting internal circulation as a function of ice crystallization rate and pressure; studying ice formation and ice crystal salinity (purity) as a function of ice crystallization rate, internal circulation, pressure, residence time, and brine concentration (temperature); determining the effect of pressure and operating ranges to avoid hydrate formation; determining how hydrate formation is related to feed and/or reject brine concentrations; and determining the effect of varying residence time. The ice slurry R&D includes investigating the maximum ice concentration in slurries that can be pumped without difficulty within the range of 15 – 25% ice concentration; and the effect of various temperatures on the flow characteristics of these slurries. Cryosol investigations include determining and graphing at what point and to what extent viscosity diluents are needed to maintain good slurry flow within the range of temperatures from 32F to the eutectic; and the identification and properties of effective non-toxic viscosity diluents. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.