Chapter 6: Desalination, brine mining and resource efficiency

The world needs more water, and some analysts argue that desalination is the only path toward long-term water security. Already there are more than 16,000 desalination plants worldwide, yet the technology still remains too expensive and energy inefficient to qualify as a silver bullet solution.

Advances in this area are being made rapidly: there are patents being filed and some nanotechnologies may significantly reduce energy consumption. Graphene membranes have reduced consumption by as much as 46 percent in lab environments, and could cut costs by up to 20 percent.

Brine mining also shows strong promise for improving the desalination landscape. Mining this resource to extract minerals could reduce waste and create a revenue stream, providing valuable material for fertilizers, pharmaceuticals, plastics, solvents, electronics, batteries and more. Looking even further ahead, we may see new applications of algae, some of which thrive in high saline environments.