Desalination of Water by using Superhydrophobic Fabric Available to Purchase

In this study, superhydrophobic fabric is prepared with a wet-chemical coating technique that uses a coating solution synthesized by the co-hydrolysis and co-condensation of tetraethyl orthosilicate and fluoroalkyl silane (tridecafluorooctyl triethoxysilane) under an alkaline condition. The treated fabric shows stable superhydrophobicity with a water contact angle as high as 171°, and a sliding angle as low as 2°. The coated fabric has higher repellency to saline water, and its repellency increases with increases in the salt content in the solution. The contact angle is reduced with increases in liquid temperature. When the water temperature is 90°C, the contact angle on the superhydrophobic fabric is 153°. The superhydrophobic treatment slightly reduces the air permeability, but increases the water vapor permeability of the fabric. The treatment considerably increases the liquid breakthrough pressure, but has little effect on fabric pore size and thermal conductivity. The air gap membrane distillation process is used to evaluate the desalination performance of the superhydrophobic fabric. When the feed and the condenser are kept at 90°C and 20°C, respectively, the membrane distillation (MD) system with the superhydrophobic fabric yields a permeate flux of water up to 13.8 kg m^-2 hour^-1, which is slightly higher than that with the use of polymer and inorganic MD membranes reported. Superhydrophobic fabrics may thus be considered as effective MD membranes for water desalination applications.