Technology/ Korea Water: June 9, 2008: Solar powered desalination.

When I worked briefly at the water magazine, two things I really enjoyed doing were international stories and technology stories. (In fact, I've noticed a distinct decline in both those areas since I left.) However, when I started this blog I decided to keep the focus reasonably well-defined and therefore I've left out most of the technology news.

But here we have a neat story where the two areas overlap. FYI, a desalination plant removes salt from seawater in order to provide drinking water. They generally do so by pushing the water through a membrane. As water heavy, and the membrane offers resistance, they require a lot of energy. Unfortunately, most means of creating energy have their own limitations and disadvantages, such as greenhouse gas emissions or nuclear waste that must be disposed of.

For some time, what I've thought is that someone somewhere should create a tidal powered desalination plant, but here we have reports of a solar powered one being created in Libya with Korean assistance.

A very interesting story.

Peter Huston
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http://www.libyaonline.com/news/details.php?id=4031

Business News Print
Korea, Libya to Jointly Harness Solar Power. 2008-06-08

The Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) said Tuesday that ‎it will develop an advanced type of solar energy generation system for the Renewable ‎Energies and Water Desalination Research Center (REWDRC) of Libya. ‎

For the solar project, the government research agencies of South Korea and Libya and ‎a Korean research firm named KONES said that they will invest $5 million each over ‎the next five years to develop a cost-efficient solar generating system known as "dye-‎sensitized solar cells." ‎

For the final negotiation over the deal, REWDRC's director Salem Ghurbal arrived in ‎Korea on Tuesday, they said, adding they will soon sign an official contract. The dye-‎sensitized solar cell is a new class of low-cost cell. ‎

While the traditional solar panels use black silicon materials to convert solar energy to ‎electricity, this type of solar cell uses photosensitive dye for that purpose. ‎

The cells are promising because they are made of low-cost materials and do not need ‎elaborate apparatus to manufacture. ETRI claims to have many core patents on this ‎technology.
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Using the cells, ETRI said it can lower the cost of solar panel generation from the ‎current 700 won ($0.7) per kilowatt hour (kWh) to 70 won ($0.07) by 2015. ‎

If it goes according to plan, the dye-sensitized solar generation can compete with ‎nuclear power (40 won per kWh) and hydro-electric power (85 won per kWh).

{Tripolipost}