A review on energy consumption of desalination processes

The technologies that are used mainly in the seawater desalination industry are reviewed and evaluated in this article. The utilization principles, applications, and problems of these processes are summarized and discussed. The desalination methods are compared with each other for performance ratio (PR), gain output ratio (GOR), unit energy consumption (kWh/m(3)), or unit operating cost ($/m(3)) and afterward the preferred method is identified.