Thermal analysis of low temperature seawater multi-effect distillation system

Mathematical model and thermal analysis were performed for the low temperature multi-effect distillation system combined with thermal vapor compression(LT-MED-TVC).The variation in temperature loss as a function of effect number was carried out and the effects of the top brine temperature,the number of the evaporator′s effects and the motive steam pressure on grained output ratio(GOR) and specific heat transfer area were also studied.The results indicate that temperature losses increase significantly in the last effect evaporator.The thermal performance of LT-MED-TVC is much better than that of LT-MED.Better performance is obtained by increasing the top brine temperature,the number of the effects and the motive steam pressure for the operation of the system.