A desalination process essentially separates saline water into two parts - one that has a low concentration of salt (treated water or product water), and the other with a much higher concentration than the original feed water, usually referred to as brine concentrate or simply as ‘concentrate’. The two major types of technologies that are used around the world for desalination can be broadly classified as either thermal or membrane. Both technologies need energy to operate and produce fresh water.

 

The economics of desalination are complex and very dependent on regional factors, availability of power, seawater, infrastructure and novel material technologies. These technologies are typically rated by assessing the cost per acre foot of fresh water produced. Our interest in desalination is tangential to our primary objective, which is the production of cost effective power, using steam, which can then be used in a downstream open circuit desalination process.

 

Remote local power generation is a prime application of the MIST technologies.  Such venues are very common in marine coastal locations, especially in third world and developing countries, which coincidentally often share a similar demand for sources of fresh potable drinking water.

 

Today the superheated steam used to drive power generation turbines is derived through the isobaric heating of water in a thermodynamic process known as the Rankine or modified Carnot cycle. For centuries steam has been produced this way and the energetics of this process are precisely defined.

 

Molecular Impact Steam Technology (MIST) utilizes hydraulic energy to accelerate water to hypersonic velocities and impacts the water within the unique geometry of a metallic impact chamber. We are fully satisfied that our measurements demonstrate that the resulting heat and steam released on impact, are an energetically  more efficient way of producing steam, compared to conventional Rankine isobaric cycle heating.

 

The MIST system is capable of producing continuous dry or saturated steam at a wide range of pressures and temperatures. While power generation is the primary focus of MIST the resulting source of downstream steam, following the exit from our proposed rotary expander, can be condensed into usable water. The exiting lower pressure steam can be used to provide the vapor source for either Multi-Stage Flash Distillation (MSF) or Multi-Effect Distillation (MED) units. The MIST Energy Systems rotary expander system can produce power in the megawatt range from a variety of gaseous sources including both dry and saturated steam and is capable of being staged with a high and lower pressure turbo expanders. The system is relatively compact and can be packaged in a single steel shipping container along with the MIST system.

 

During the course of our research and development MIST Engineers observed some remarkable effects, which require a comprehensive physical-chemical explanation, but this does not render these effects un-useful.  When highly filtered salt water is injected into the impact chamber apparatus at high pressures and high temperatures molecular separation of the oxygen and hydrogen was consistently observed with corresponding violent ignition.

 

When properly harnessed, this effect can be used to provide additional energy to the helical turbo rotators. The strong hydrogen bonding in water accounts for the relatively high heat of vaporization; that is the amount of energy required to convert liquid water to vapor (steam).

 

Heat produced either by the combustion of fossil fuels or nuclear reactors brings about the solid to gaseous phase transition in water. The amount of heat used to produce a given amount of steam is quantified in terms of boiler horsepower. Peer reviewed research at universities in both Japan and Israel dealing with the physics of high speed impacts involving water suggested that there might be another mechanism, besides direct heating, available to disrupt the intermolecular bonding in water. In these studies, hydraulically pressurized water was injected at hypersonic velocities at an impact target with dramatic results. These were merely studies with no direct interest in applying these observations towards the production of steam, the most prevalent and common working fluid.

 

Additional papers dealing with the theoretical fluid dynamics of water droplet impact and the resulting radial velocity increases and shock wave propagation at the instantaneous moment of impact further reinforced the suggestion that enormous physical forces could contribute to the separation of water molecules and the conversion of kinetic energy into heat.

 

Recent research involving high voltage electrical discharges in a fog chamber (Graneau et al.)  produced results similar to what we observe. The output heat energy exceeded the input electrical energy required to produce the electric arc. While an intriguing concept, no commercial sustainable design, capable of producing continuous power output was ever developed. We believe that a similar mechanism to MIST may be involved, inasmuch as there is explosive local heating of the water vapor followed by some disassociation into the oxygen and hydrogen molecular components of the water caused by an electrolytic effect. MIST, on the other hand, relies on hydraulic acceleration of the water, which following the shattering event, cannot exist in the liquid phase within the impact chamber and is subsequently completed converted to steam.

 

The explosions observed can only be ascribed to the violent reaction of molecular hydrogen and oxygen within the impact chamber. The question arises as to the source of the molecular oxygen and hydrogen and the cause for subsequent ignition. It is understood that water will begin to disassociate at temperatures beginning at 2200 degrees C (3% disassociation) and continue to dissociate more completely at 3000 degrees C (50% disassociation). This situation arises in nuclear reactors, especially when there is a thermal runaway condition.

 

Water is conventionally separated into molecular hydrogen and oxygen using electrochemical methods, particularly electrolysis. It is also understood that electrolytic separation of water proceeds more efficiently at high temperatures and high pressures and in fact there are two commercial processes that incorporate this technology known respectively as HTE (High Temperature Electrolysis) and HPE (High Pressure Electrolysis).

 

Both high temperature and high pressure conditions exist within the MIST impact chamber. The missing element would be electric current, but there is a strong reason to believe that there may be an electrodynamic event occurring coincident with the high velocity impact of the water against the heated chamber wall.

 

Water, as is well known, is a strongly polar solvent. The water molecule has a strong electro-negative and electro positive component and there is a tendency for water molecules to organize to achieve electrical neutrality. When water evaporates an electrical charge is carried into the atmosphere and may discharge in the form of a lightning bolt. It is reasonable to believe that the high energy and resulting shock wave associated with the impact of the water droplets cause a similar charge separation event, with a corresponding discharge into the highly conductive impact chamber steel. This current flow would provide the electrochemical element necessary to satisfy the requirements for electrolysis as well as the ignition source.

 

 

Theoretically, temperatures on the order to 2200 – 3000 degrees C may occur within picoseconds (10-12 seconds) of the injected water impact and this may explain the conversion of a certain amount of the water into its molecular form, but the detonation of the mixture requires a spark or high internal temperature and this would imply electrical discharge somewhere within the MIST apparatus, but again this implies electrolysis.

 

With the properly designed apparatus this combustion power can be harnessed in the production of electricity. Since the solutes in the water are still present following the explosion, engineering techniques must be devised to efficiently separate these salts and contaminants in such a way that the impact steam system is not impaired and can continue to operate. The design of the injectors is such that all surfaces coming in contact with dissolved solutes are especially plated with non-corrosive coatings and further enable the injectors to operate with a fluid of very low viscosity.

 

A system to periodically flush the condensers has been developed which should allow continuous operation followed by a periodic cleaning cycle to remove precipitated and other undesirable depositions.

 

In summary, MIST steam technology has the capacity to generate low cost electrical power when combined with multi-stage helical expanders and at the same time, produce potable water as a by-product.