PV-RO Designer of a PV System-Powered Desalination Plant －Case Study

Energy and water signify two resources of outmost importance for developing countries, mainly due to rapidly increasing population and growing need for upgrading their standard of living to an acceptable one. Photovoltaic system (PVs) provide a viable means for decentralized energy and water production in arid areas, which also usually present on abundant solar resource. Recently, Libya is suffering from electricity shortage for many reasons. In order to cover the electricity shortage from the utility grid, this work presents a computer application to have an alternative power supply to operate reverse osmosis (RO) desalination unit using a photovoltaic system (PVs). PVs rely heavily on the availability of weather data (at selected sites) and the accuracy of predicting the load profile. Both parameters are not easy to be determined accurately, and this is a reason for the existence of this study by developing a computer application to obtain all these parameters that are required for the sizing of a stand-alone PV-RO system. This computer application including friendly interface is applied in one of water plants of West Zawiyah, Libya called “Soquia Water Company”, as a case study. The develop computer application can be applied to any site.