KESS® Technologies Inc.

KESSWater.com
How much power does KESS require to produce fresh water? or
How many kilowatt hours (kWh) / per Meter3 fresh water?
(…and that’s just the start of the cost and operational problems for SWRO…)
 

In the SWRO (sea water reverse osmosis) and heat evaporation worlds, this is one of the most important and used defining attributes of any system.

For KESSWater.com, this is not as relevant a term, though the equivalent will be offered here to try and put things on as equal a level playing field as possible.

For those that just want a quick answer…at the cost of putting the cart before the horse a bit, the quick, rough answer is approx.. * = < 1kWh /1 meter3 water.

To put things into grand perspective.  A typical SWRO plant requires up to 10 kWh ( over 10X/1,000% times) the energy to produce a cubic meter of water.  

All SWRO systems produce water that still has salt in it… many passes are required to get to a potable quality water… KESSWater on the other hand, requires only a single pass to produce nearly ion free deionized/distilled water.

That is just the beginning of the downfall of all SWRO systems however.  

KESSWater has almost none of the permanent infrastructure, machinery, parts and maintenance expenses of SWRO.

There are no semi-permeable membranes, high psi pumps, high amp motors, combustion chambers, high pressure vessels, or SS plumbing, etc.… for it all… Not to mention the infrastructure and/or storage facilities for whatever fossil fuel is being used… to boil the water, to produce the steam, to turn the blades, to generate the electricity, to push the motors, to drive the 1,000 psi pumps, through the semi-permeable membranes, etc., etc.,  etc…  In KESSWater, you can just throw all of that away.

In other words, KESSWater cells will have almost a 100% online operating efficiency.    There is virtually nothing to ever go bad or wrong.

Compare that to any SWRO system ever manufactured whose average downtime is about one month (800 hrs.) a year.   So, let’s say a KESSWater field has 10 systems, all operating autonomously and independently.  When one is down for 30 minutes a week to be cleaned, the other nine are still operating at full capacity.  Compare that to SWRO.

The reason for the “*” above is that unlike SWRO systems, the KESSWater answer changes a bit and depends upon a few atmospheric variables.  Water temp., air temp., atmospheric pressure, etc.

On a hot, arid day, low pressure day with warm water temps., the production is different than a cold, humid, high-pressure day.  Both extremes produce water at significantly less energy cost than SWRO, but the actual number varies with the conditions, even in a closed KESSWater cell system.

The Layman’s Guide to KESS®© Technologies
Optimized Modular Desalination Cells
“Helping to solve the world’s fresh water shortage”

Many have asked for a simple concise guide to complement the KESS Science and Patent White Papers, which focuses on the “how” and “why” questions, primarily utilizing the physics and the math.

While appropriate for some, most people aren’t really interested in formulas, variables, equations, etc. … just a simple quick explanation, “What is “It”, and How does “It” work? ...in straightforward simple to understand language.

So here goes.

What is KESS? KESS Cells represents the ability to affordably and economically extract fresh water from salt/brackish waters on a modularly based large scale, without RO membranes, motors, and pumps. At its lowest common denominator, KESS (Kinetic Energy Solar Still) captures and sums many small incremental improvements and discovered physics phenomena, to vastly increase the overall efficiency of desalination systems, while importantly, requiring only renewable energy (solar, wind, donkeys/camels walking in circles, etc.).

When people ask how KESS works (recently U.S. Patents and Intr’l WIPO Trademark published), our best reply, to date, has been to use an example most all of us can relate to. We offer that, generally speaking, KESS can be thought of as a “hurricane in a box”. Painting that “word picture” pretty much says it all.

Just like birds hinting to men, that flight Was possible, hurricanes can lead us to understand, and offer many hints for how to extract fresh drinkable water from the saline oceans/seas.

Most everyone knows that hurricanes are responsible for extracting and collecting massive amounts of fresh water, from the salt water oceans/seas, transporting and dumping (sometimes many feet of it), onto dry land. We’ve seen and experienced this first hand.

The planet is what scientists universally call an “open system”. That is, man can’t and doesn’t control any of these many processes… We can only observe, monitor, and record the results. How fast are the winds? What are the air and water temps? Where and how much water is collected? What is the air pressure? Etc.…

But, What If, what IF, in a fully enclosed “closed system” you could not only observe and monitor these variables, but control, optimize and maximize them at the same time as well? The standard accepted evaporation predication equation used for almost 60 years has only (6) variables. KESS not only controls these variables in a “box” (closed system), but adds another (10) previously undescribed and primarily unknown variables; while simultaneously optimizing and maximizing each. And when you sum all these small (and some large) incremental improvements, within a closed system, the resultant production gain is sizeable.

We KNOW (control and optimize) how the fresh water separates/evaporates from the salt water. We KNOW (control and optimize) where and when the water will condense and collect. We KNOW (and control) what the internal temps and pressures are. We KNOW (and maximize) what the evaporative surface areas are; (no longer squared on a level (X*Y), but rather nearly (X*Y) ^3)) inside the system. How? In some part, by optimizing the surface areas and controlled via programmed internal micro voltage powered PLC’s (automated computer controls), sensors and valves.

IF you understand and comply with the physics and what the math says MUST happen, the rest is seemingly straightforward, providing the appropriate are known and controlled.

The autonomous discrete and modular KESS Cell devices actually then become the derivate result of what the equations describe. In fact, you can see the parts in situ and their corresponding variables. It all makes perfect sense, once seen in the proper light.

Let’s take a step back and quickly look at the competing desalination technologies and how they compare to KESS. Reverse Osmosis (RO), standard and multi-effect Solar Desalination.

RO systems, universally, all share common theory and attributes. Push salt water through semi-permeable membranes that capture the salt ions, using much of this extracted water to backflush the salt out of the membranes, then dump the resulting (highly toxic concentrated) brine back into the source (sea, ocean, etc.), then repeat.

What pressures do RO and salt water RO (SWRO) systems require? Anywhere from 1,000 – 2,000 psi… Which is a LOT. This requires expensive, often replaced membranes, huge, expensive pumps, and even larger high wattage, power draining motors. And, afterwards you’re dumping more than half of the intake water right back into the ocean/sea, as a highly toxic, environmentally hazardous waste material concentrated brine that kills everything in huge “dead zones”. That’s RO (SWRO), in a nutshell. “Good, bad, and ugly.”

Note: It should be strongly emphasized here that KESS technology, (owing to the absence of foulable/clogged membranes), will be working extremely well in concert with, (not against) SWRO plants. How? KESS can easily accept the toxic effluent water from SWRO systems, and efficiently reduce it down to its baggable byproducts salt, and water. KESS can effortlessly go places where no RO system can.

Let’s now look at some of the earlier attempts at solar desalination. Many bright, learned, and well-funded people have failed in these directions. Ignoring (or perhaps unfamiliar with the physics and underlying principles). Earlier systems attempted to focus maximum solar energy (with large parabolic mirrors, etc.) onto static, horizontal, minimized, surface areas (long round pipe tubes, etc.)

As it was “known and assumed” that water needed to heated to the boiling point for steam to form, and desalination to occur, all of these systems required high temps (at 212º F/100ºC), which (according to the basic gas laws) necessarily resulted in high vapor pressures (which in actuality was acting in direct opposition to the evaporation they were trying to achieve) resulting in the need for even more (expensive) power to inefficiently compensate, then condense and collect the water. These scenarios created multiple problems. The pipes quickly clogged; systems failed. And, for the short time they were operating, only ran during daylight hours. (Note: KESS operates 24/7).

Memo/Hint: The take away to be learned from water boiling isn’t the high joule input and temperatures required, rather, it is the continuous release of gas from solution, which unbinds/captures and frees water molecules from solution as the air rises from the liquid. KESS induces a volumetric “gas release” via much less costly means than the mega joules required for boiling water.

Lets’ look at how hurricanes (and KESS) operate. As with hurricanes, KESS doesn’t require high pressures… In fact, hurricanes and KESS operate efficiently at very low pressures, minus psi, not 1,000-2,000 psi. Likewise, KESS doesn’t require high temps, in fact KESS operates efficiently at around 90ºF, like every hurricane. And KESS, like hurricanes, are anything but static, like all other prior solar desalination systems.

In fact, KESS derives its WIPO World trademarked name in part, from a highly agitated, violent, environment, just like hurricanes, by introduction of kinetic mixing on several levels. As no/little pressure or mechanical torque/friction is introduced into the system (relative to RO), very little costly power is necessary or required.

Hurricanes condense water by cooling and other processes; so does KESS, but not by going up in elevation, but by increasing atmospheric pressure (again while simultaneously decreasing atmospheric pressure in the prior evaporation phase), and then going downward with the humidified air flow, utilizing the earth’s “universal” planet wide, below grade ambient temperature, to create temperature delta drops often in excess of 40º-50ºF, to cool the surface collection elements, necessary for condensation optimization.

So, if you look at the directions all the others have taken, and they have all gone in one direction, KESS goes in the exact opposite… When they all have Zigged, KESS has Zagged…. This is a brief summary, with many of the “classified” details obviously omitted, but in general, That’s KESS in a nutshell.

Floatable: KESS Cells are not necessarily land based as might be expected or presumed. It should be inserted here that KESS cells are designed and engineered to also float. Where protected bays, inlets, and harbors are the only space available, KESS cells can produce their fresh water, while floating.

KESS downsides: Nothing is perfect or free and this paper would be incomplete without mentioning both sides of the equation. While KESS will be much cheaper to install and operate, easier to use, far more energy efficient, and (most critically) - completely environmentally benign and Safe, KESS Cells are not the best solution in all situations.

• • KESS requires substantially more land area (3-4X) than RO, on a strictly - m^3 water produced / m^2 land area basis. So if land area is unavailable or at a high premium, KESS may not be the best solution. Piping the salt/saline water to inexpensive unused land for KESS to operate may offer the best compromise.
• • KESS still needs critical health minerals (mg+, etc.) re-added to the produced fresh water (like all distilled/bottled water) if used for long term drinking purposes.
• • KESS does not seamlessly work in VOC (volatile organic compound/high vapor pressure) contaminated water sources. IF necessary a VOC pre-treatment system is still required.
• • If the byproduct(s) is/are not a valuable /saleable commodity (like salt), then an approved storage site and transportation may be required.