IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/renene/v133y2019icp1327-1337.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Evaluation of the economics of desalination by integrating greenhouse gas emission costs: An empirical application for Chile

Author

Listed:
  • Molinos-Senante, María
  • González, Diego

Abstract

Desalinated water is an alternative and feasible water source that can help solve water scarcity problems. However, most desalination plants are operated using fossil fuels, which contribute to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. To face the problem of climate change, many countries are developing policies that promote renewable energy for electricity production. These policies might impact desalination costs. This paper proposes a methodology to evaluate the economics of desalination by integrating investment costs, operational and maintenance costs, and GHG emissions costs. This method will enable us to determine the impact of renewable energy polices on desalination costs. The empirical application was developed for Chile, a country with a promising future in renewable energy, and revealed that the full costs of desalinated water decrease by approximately 22% when the current electricity production mix is changed to predominantly renewable energy production. Moreover, this application illustrated the relevance of adopting a carbon tax to motivate the switch to renewable energy. This study demonstrates that the adoption of renewable energy policies involves a notable synergy with water issues.

Suggested Citation

  • Molinos-Senante, María & González, Diego, 2019. "Evaluation of the economics of desalination by integrating greenhouse gas emission costs: An empirical application for Chile," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 1327-1337.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:renene:v:133:y:2019:i:c:p:1327-1337
    DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2018.09.019
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960148118310826
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.renene.2018.09.019?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mahmoud Shatat & Saffa B. Riffat, 2014. "Water desalination technologies utilizing conventional and renewable energy sources," International Journal of Low-Carbon Technologies, Oxford University Press, vol. 9(1), pages 1-19.
    2. Bilton, Amy M. & Wiesman, Richard & Arif, A.F.M. & Zubair, Syed M. & Dubowsky, Steven, 2011. "On the feasibility of community-scale photovoltaic-powered reverse osmosis desalination systems for remote locations," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 36(12), pages 3246-3256.
    3. Swaminathan, Jaichander & Chung, Hyung Won & Warsinger, David M. & Lienhard V, John H., 2018. "Energy efficiency of membrane distillation up to high salinity: Evaluating critical system size and optimal membrane thickness," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 211(C), pages 715-734.
    4. Al-Nory, Malak & El-Beltagy, Mohamed, 2014. "An energy management approach for renewable energy integration with power generation and water desalination," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 377-385.
    5. Hickman, William & Muzhikyan, Aramazd & Farid, Amro M., 2017. "The synergistic role of renewable energy integration into the unit commitment of the energy water nexus," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 220-229.
    6. Stuber, Matthew D., 2016. "Optimal design of fossil-solar hybrid thermal desalination for saline agricultural drainage water reuse," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 552-563.
    7. G. Donoso & E. Blanco & G. Franco & J. Lira, 2016. "Water footprints and irrigated agricultural sustainability: the case of Chile," International Journal of Water Resources Development, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(5), pages 738-748, September.
    8. Alhazmy, Majed M., 2014. "Economic and thermal feasibility of multi stage flash desalination plant with brine–feed mixing and cooling," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 1029-1035.
    9. Mata-Torres, Carlos & Escobar, Rodrigo A. & Cardemil, José M. & Simsek, Yeliz & Matute, José A., 2017. "Solar polygeneration for electricity production and desalination: Case studies in Venezuela and northern Chile," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 387-398.
    10. Pinto, F. Silva & Marques, R. Cunha, 2017. "Desalination projects economic feasibility: A standardization of cost determinants," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 904-915.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Esmaeil Ahmadi & Benjamin McLellan & Behnam Mohammadi-Ivatloo & Tetsuo Tezuka, 2020. "The Role of Renewable Energy Resources in Sustainability of Water Desalination as a Potential Fresh-Water Source: An Updated Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(13), pages 1-31, June.
    2. Bar-Nahum, Ziv & Reznik, Ami & Finkelshtain, Israel & Kan, Iddo, 2022. "Centralized water management under lobbying: Economic analysis of desalination in Israel," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    3. Prado de Nicolás, Amanda & Molina-García, Ángel & García-Bermejo, Juan Tomás & Vera-García, Francisco, 2023. "Desalination, minimal and zero liquid discharge powered by renewable energy sources: Current status and future perspectives," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 187(C).
    4. Lorena Cornejo-Ponce & Patricia Vilca-Salinas & María Janet Arenas-Herrera & Claudia Moraga-Contreras & Héctor Tapia-Caroca & Stavros Kukulis-Martínez, 2022. "Small-Scale Solar-Powered Desalination Plants: A Sustainable Alternative Water-Energy Nexus to Obtain Water for Chile’s Coastal Areas," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(23), pages 1-38, December.
    5. Ailliot, Pierre & Boutigny, Marie & Koutroulis, Eftichis & Malisovas, Athanasios & Monbet, Valérie, 2020. "Stochastic weather generator for the design and reliability evaluation of desalination systems with Renewable Energy Sources," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 541-553.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Vakilifard, Negar & A. Bahri, Parisa & Anda, Martin & Ho, Goen, 2018. "A two-level decision making approach for optimal integrated urban water and energy management," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 408-425.
    2. Esmaeil Ahmadi & Benjamin McLellan & Behnam Mohammadi-Ivatloo & Tetsuo Tezuka, 2020. "The Role of Renewable Energy Resources in Sustainability of Water Desalination as a Potential Fresh-Water Source: An Updated Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(13), pages 1-31, June.
    3. Omar, Amr & Nashed, Amir & Li, Qiyuan & Leslie, Greg & Taylor, Robert A., 2020. "Pathways for integrated concentrated solar power - Desalination: A critical review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    4. Ahmadi, Esmaeil & McLellan, Benjamin & Tezuka, Tetsuo, 2020. "The economic synergies of modelling the renewable energy-water nexus towards sustainability," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 162(C), pages 1347-1366.
    5. Vakilifard, Negar & A. Bahri, Parisa & Anda, Martin & Ho, Goen, 2019. "An interactive planning model for sustainable urban water and energy supply," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 235(C), pages 332-345.
    6. Muhanji, Steffi Olesi & Barrows, Clayton & Macknick, Jordan & Farid, Amro M., 2021. "An enterprise control assessment case study of the energy–water nexus for the ISO New England system," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 141(C).
    7. Muhanji, Steffi O. & Farid, Amro M., 2020. "An enterprise control methodology for the techno-economic assessment of the energy water nexus," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 260(C).
    8. Ariana M. Pietrasanta & Mostafa F. Shaaban & Pio A. Aguirre & Sergio F. Mussati & Mohamed A. Hamouda, 2023. "Simulation and Optimization of Renewable Energy-Powered Desalination: A Bibliometric Analysis and Highlights of Recent Research," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-28, June.
    9. de Oliveira, Glauber Cardoso & Bertone, Edoardo & Stewart, Rodney A., 2022. "Challenges, opportunities, and strategies for undertaking integrated precinct-scale energy–water system planning," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    10. Qasem, Naef A.A. & Lawal, Dahiru U. & Aljundi, Isam H. & Abdallah, Ayman M. & Panchal, Hitesh, 2022. "Novel integration of a parallel-multistage direct contact membrane distillation plant with a double-effect absorption refrigeration system," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 323(C).
    11. Vivar, M. & H, Sharon & Fuentes, M., 2024. "Photovoltaic system adoption in water related technologies – A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 189(PB).
    12. Pavičević, Matija & De Felice, Matteo & Busch, Sebastian & Hidalgo González, Ignacio & Quoilin, Sylvain, 2021. "Water-energy nexus in African power pools – The Dispa-SET Africa model," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 228(C).
    13. Ghorbani, Bahram & Mehrpooya, Mehdi & Ghasemzadeh, Hossein, 2018. "Investigation of a hybrid water desalination, oxy-fuel power generation and CO2 liquefaction process," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 1105-1119.
    14. Mito, Mohamed T. & Ma, Xianghong & Albuflasa, Hanan & Davies, Philip A., 2019. "Reverse osmosis (RO) membrane desalination driven by wind and solar photovoltaic (PV) energy: State of the art and challenges for large-scale implementation," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 669-685.
    15. Mentis, Dimitrios & Karalis, George & Zervos, Arthouros & Howells, Mark & Taliotis, Constantinos & Bazilian, Morgan & Rogner, Holger, 2016. "Desalination using renewable energy sources on the arid islands of South Aegean Sea," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 262-272.
    16. Sharan, Prashant & Bandyopadhyay, Santanu, 2016. "Energy optimization in parallel/cross feed multiple-effect evaporator based desalination system," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 756-767.
    17. Ismail, Mohamed M. & Dincer, Ibrahim, 2023. "A new renewable energy based integrated gasification system for hydrogen production from plastic wastes," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 270(C).
    18. Hipólito-Valencia, Brígido J. & Mosqueda-Jiménez, Francisco Waldemar & Barajas-Fernández, Juan & Ponce-Ortega, José M., 2021. "Incorporating a seawater desalination scheme in the optimal water use in agricultural activities," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 244(C).
    19. Zhao, Yuhuan & Shi, Qiaoling & li, Hao & Qian, Zhiling & Zheng, Lu & Wang, Song & He, Yizhang, 2022. "Simulating the economic and environmental effects of integrated policies in energy-carbon-water nexus of China," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 238(PA).
    20. Uche, J. & Muzás, A. & Acevedo, L.E. & Usón, S. & Martínez, A. & Bayod, A.A., 2020. "Experimental tests to validate the simulation model of a Domestic Trigeneration Scheme with hybrid RESs and Desalting Techniques," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 407-419.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:renene:v:133:y:2019:i:c:p:1327-1337. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/renewable-energy .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.