Architecting of All-Cellulose-Based Wicking Fabric for a Large-Scale, Low-Cost, and Highly Efficient Solar Desalination Evaporator.

Authors

Feng Xia, Yankuan Tian, Xinyue Zhang, Yifei Gong, Xin Yang, Xinqi Guo, Shukang Yang, Yan Hu, Xue Xu, Rong Zhou, Xueli Wang, Faxue Li, Jianyong Yu, Tingting Gao

Published in

ACS nano. Volume 19. Issue 9. Pages 8608-8620. Mar 11, 2025. Epub Mar 01, 2025.

Abstract

Interfacial solar vapor generation (ISVG) technology has been considered a promising and sustainable strategy for seawater desalination and wastewater treatment. However, its practical application is greatly limited due to severe salt accumulation and poor long-term evaporation stability. Herein, an all-cellulose-based wicking fabric (CB@CA/CF) is fabricated via a breath figure template (BFT) method for high-performance and stable desalination. The abundant porous structure of carbon black@cellulose acetate (CB@CA) endows the evaporator with high light absorption (∼96.9%) and rapid steam escape. The hydrophilic CA network also changes the hydration state and greatly reduces the water evaporation enthalpy. More importantly, the unique double-layer porous structure of CB@CA and cotton fabric (CF) produces a rapid antigravitational wicking effect, providing sufficient water supply for vapor generation and preventing salt accumulation on the evaporator surface. As a result, the CB@CA/CF evaporator can achieve high evaporation rates of 2.08 kg m^-2 h^-1 in pure water and 1.98 kg m^-2 h^-1 in a 3.5 wt % NaCl solution under one-sun irradiation, without any salt accumulation over 8 h. Moreover, the designed floating evaporation system can obtain a high freshwater collection of 8.39 kg m^-2 per day under natural environmental conditions. This work provides an effective path for developing stable and highly efficient freshwater acquisition and shows great prospects in the field of seawater desalination and wastewater treatment.

PMID:
40066490
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 11 Mar 2025.

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