Drinkable water is necessary for life. Despite this fact, it is unfortunate that approximately 1.1 billion people cannot access clean water while 2.4 billion suffer from illnesses due to drinking unclean water.
Although there are advancements in science with water treatment methods to produce drinkable water, most are extremely costly. Thus countries with poor sectors can only produce them at a low productivity rate.
More recent technology has demonstrated great promise as an alternative to producing clean water. This technology is known as direct solar steam generation (DSSG), and it involves harvesting the sun’s energy and heat to convert liquid into vapor.
This method helps to remove any soluble impurities in the water and desalinates it. The steam is then cooled and collected for use. Although DSSG is a promising solution to bringing water scarcity problems in the world to an end, its applicability may take time.
Albeit a simple technology, one of its key processes, evaporation, present hindrances for it to be commercialized. Even with the existing technology, we have reached the theoretical limit of evaporation. Despite this, it is still not enough to commercialize Direct Solar Steam Generation.