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Numerical study of desalination characteristics of flow-by type cation intercalation desalination cells with different structural parameters

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Abstract

With the development of the water treatment technology by capacitive deionization (CDI) method, some intercalation materials are gradually used in electrodes to enhance the desalination performance. In this paper, the mass conservation equation, energy conservation equation, and current conservation equation are coupled to establish a theoretical framework for modeling CDIs using intercalation materials, and the multi-physical fields such as the flow field, the electric field, and ion concentration distribution during the charging and discharging processes are analyzed. The effects of structural parameters such as the electrode thickness, spacer channel size, and ion exchange membrane thickness on the ion concentration distribution, intercalated-Na fraction distribution, volumetric energy consumption, salt adsorption capacity (SAC), and average salt adsorption rate (ASAR) are also investigated. The results show that during the charging process, the concentration increases from the inlet to the outlet on the left side of the membrane and decreases from the inlet to the outlet on the right side of the membrane. The intercalated-Na fraction distribution exhibits a certain degree of inhomogeneity in both the electrode thickness direction and the flow direction. An increased spacer channel size delays the time for the effluent concentration to reach its maximum, and increasing the thickness of the electrode not only has a similar effect, but also has a longer overall desalination time. Increasing the thickness of the ion exchange membrane significantly increases the magnitude of the cell voltage change, while the increase in electrode thickness significantly delays the time for the cell to reach the cutoff voltage. An increase in electrode thickness weakens the ASAR and increases the volumetric energy consumption, so choosing a smaller electrode thickness in the appropriate current density range can help improve the performance of the cell. Increasing the size of the spacer channel will weaken the concentration drop and SAC, so a larger spacer channel size is not conducive to the improvement of the desalination performance. Increasing the thickness of the ion exchange membrane leads to increased energy consumption and reduced SAC, so choosing a thinner ion exchange membrane thickness in the appropriate current density range can help improve the cell performance.

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Data availability

The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Funding

This work is financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 51906091 and 51776092) and Qinglan Project of Jiangsu Province of China.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Energy and Power Engineering, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, No. 666 Changhui Road, Zhenjiang, 212100, Jiangsu, China

    Rui Liu, Qiqi Zhang, Shouguang Yao & Yan Shen

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  1. Rui Liu
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  2. Qiqi Zhang
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  3. Shouguang Yao
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  4. Yan Shen
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Correspondence to Rui Liu or Shouguang Yao.

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Liu, R., Zhang, Q., Yao, S. et al. Numerical study of desalination characteristics of flow-by type cation intercalation desalination cells with different structural parameters. Ionics 29, 1431–1446 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11581-023-04907-1

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