Along with the decline of fresh water resources, desalination has grown in an increasingly significant technology. The utilization of sustainable energy sources, especially solar energy, has tremendous advantages over traditional energy sources for desalination. Solar thermal desalination forms part of the predominant approaches to solar-driven desalination. However, it encounters significant challenges associated with elevated system costs and diminished efficiency in its traditional configuration. This review critically assesses these limitations and delves into the underlying factors contributing to the substantial expenses and reduced effectiveness of such systems. To address these issues and enhance the economic viability of solar thermal desalination while achieving high efficiency, seven key pathways are comprehensively summarized: concentrate solar radiation to collect heat and couple the collector with the distiller, interfacial evaporation, multi-mode hybrid, multi-stage approach to utilize latent heat, multipurpose, directly combine with users and artificial intelligence. The principles and design concepts of each pathway are presented in detail. Comprehensive coverage is given to research methodologies, as well as the limitations, advantages, disadvantages, and future directions unique to each pathway, drawing upon the characteristics of existing research. Based on these pathways, solar thermal desalination will overcome traditional challenges, undergo gradual commercialization, and emerge as a viable option for desalination in the future. Furthermore, this review provides a brief analysis of the energy and environmental aspects, emphasizing the significant importance of balancing efficient development with environmental preservation. 

Key pathways for efficient solar thermal desalination

Nowadays, desulfurization of fuel oil has raised concern globally because of strict industrial and environmental legislations. Albeit hydrodesulfurization (HDS) has been extensively used in oil refineries to produce low sulfur oil (< 10 ppm) but not been proven as effective method for the removal of dibenzothiophene (DBT), benzothiophene (TH) and their derivatives. Subsequently, adsorptive desulfurization (ADS) and oxidative desulfurization (ODS) methods have been developed to achieve high removal efficiency. In the past decade, metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) and its composites as oxidative catalysts, as well as adsorbents, have attracted the researchers owing to high surface area, tunable properties, and reusable. The present review comprises use of MOFs and their composites for the removal of sulfur from fuel oil via ODS and ADS processes. Additionally, physicochemical properties of MOFs, mechanism, pros and cons of both process, regeneration, and future challenges have been discussed briefly. Moreover, current limitations and future prospective are also discussed. 

MOFs
 for desulfurization of fuel oil: Recent advances and future insights

Solar desalination is a suitable and cost-effective system for producing fresh water from salt water. The main goal of this study is improving the thermal performance of a solar desalination with latent thermal storage system and the spraying unit. The heat loss of the solar collector increases due to the fluctuations in the intensity of solar radiation. Using phase change materials is a suitable solution for storing energy during peak hours and releasing it when the solar radiation intensity is reduced or in cloudy times. Moreover, due to the effective area of the spraying mechanism the desalination efficiency enhanced. Thermal performance of the collector was analyzed at three spraying rates of 0.25, 0.5 and 1 l/min with and without phase change material in consecutive days from 10: 00 to 14: 00. The results showed that the presented solar desalination system equipped with paraffin (as PCM) wax had the highest thermal efficiency at the spraying rate of 1 l/min and the lowest with a flow rate of 0.25 l/min. With integration PCM and spraying mechanism the amount of produced fresh water during 4 h was 1840 ml/m2 and it significantly reduced the hardness of the produced water. The solar collector simulated by Anysy and the simulated results showed a good correlation between the predicted and experimental data with reasonable accuracy (R2 > 0.97). 

Thermo-economic evaluation of a solar desalination equipped with Phase change material and spraying unit

A solar-assisted regenerative desiccant air conditioning is proposed for humid climate regions. In addition, the indirect evaporative cooling is employed to reduce air temperature. The air conditioning system can work in three different modes: dehumidification (DE), dehumidification-indirect evaporative cooling (DE-IEC), and dehumidification-indirect evaporative cooling-return air (DE-IEC-RA), in response to different humid climate conditions. The working region and system performance of the three working modes are explored theoretically and experimentally. The corresponding temperature regions of the above three working modes are 22–26 ℃, 26–34.7 ℃ and 34.7–40 ℃, respectively. With these operational modes, the supply air temperature and humidity can be within 23.2–26.1 ℃ and 51.4–59.7 %. In DE-IEC and DE-IEC-RA modes, system cooling efficiency ηDE-IEC and ηDE-IEC-RA reach 1.0–2.79 and 1.93–2.70, respectively. Moreover, the relative humidity of the supply air after desiccant dehumidification can be kept below 60 % within 95 min. With solar-assisted electric heating regeneration, the desiccant regeneration time is 24–30 min, 18–28 min shorter than only solar or only electric heating regeneration. 

A solar-assisted regenerative desiccant air conditioning with indirect evaporative cooling for humid climate region

This paper employs the compound parabolic concentrator to heat the thermal conduction oil as working fluid to a higher temperature. The feed water is sprayed and obtains heat from the working fluid in evaporation chamber. The spraying of feed water enhances heat and mass transfer and increases the vaporization intensity. The latent heat of steam is recovered to preheat the feed water which improves energy utilization. Multivariate orthogonal experiments were conducted to obtain the optimized nozzle arrangement in the evaporation chamber. Numerical simulations were performed to evaluate the effect of nozzle parameters on liquid film thickness and water production performance. In system performance experiments, the heat loss, heat recovery performance, fresh water production and gain output ratio in sunny weather were achieved. The daily fresh water production of the system was 15.1 kg with a maximum rate of 4.32 kg/h. The nozzle group arrangement optimization increases the fresh water production by 28.12 % and the maximum rate was 8.48 %. The heat recovery unit increases fresh water production by 13.18 %, with an average heat recovery efficiency of 0.85. 

Performance enhancement of compound parabolic concentrating vaporized desalination system by spraying and steam heat recovery

According to the temperature and humidity characteristics of different climates, this paper proposes a variety of operating modes of evaporative cooling-dehumidification air conditioning by different combinations of direct evaporative cooling (DEC), indirect evaporative cooling (IEC) and desiccant dehumidification (DDE). Appropriate temperature and humidity range is suggested for every operating mode. In low-humidity climates with temperatures of 28–32.7 °C, indirect evaporative cooling is employed for only temperature reduction. In low-humidity climates with temperatures of 32.7–40 °C, direct evaporative cooling is carried out firstly, followed by desiccant dehumidification. In moderate-humid climates with temperatures of 34.23–40 °C, direct evaporative cooling is carried out firstly to reduce the temperature to approximately 30 °C, followed by desiccant dehumidification, and finally indirect evaporative cooling. For high-humidity climates, desiccant dehumidification is firstly employed, then multiple-stage cooling can be employed based on the cooling requirement. The performance of these operating modes matching with moderate-temperature and high-humidity climates, high-temperature and low-humidity climates, and high-temperature and high-humidity climates respectively are demonstrated experimentally. In moderate-temperature and high-humidity climates, the system outlet air temperature is 23–26 °C and the relative humidity is 42.5–57.2%. In high-temperature and low-humidity climates and high-temperature and high-humidity climates, the effects of ambient temperature and humidity on the cooling efficiency (η), cooling capacity (Qc), and Coefficient of Performance (COP) were explored, and their maximum values are 0.914, 5156.4 W, and 14.8; 8.15, 4158.8 W, and 11.96, respectively. 

Operating modes study of evaporative cooling-dehumidification air conditioning under different climatic conditions

Investigation on Water Vapor Adsorption Performance of Carbon Based Composite Adsorption Material Acf-Silica Sol-Licl

Study on compound parabolic concentrating vaporized desalination system with preheating and heat recovery

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Operating modes study of evaporative cooling-dehumidification air conditioning under different climatic conditions

Investigation on Water Vapor Adsorption Performance of Carbon Based Composite Adsorption Material Acf-Silica Sol-Licl

Study on compound parabolic concentrating vaporized desalination system with preheating and heat recovery