Lv Fengyong, Miao Jie, Wang Zhongyu, Hu Jing, Orejon Daniel
School of Urban Construction and Safety Engineering, Shanghai Institute of Technology, Shanghai, 201418, China.
School of Energy and Power Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, 116024, China.
Adv Mater. 2025 Feb;37(6):e2410290. doi: 10.1002/adma.202410290. Epub 2024 Dec 17.
Solar evaporation contributes to sustainable and environmentally friendly production of fresh water from seawater and wastewater. However, poor salt resistance and high degree of corrosion of traditional evaporators in brine make their implementation in real applications scarce. To overcome such deficiency, a polyanionic electrolyte functionalization strategy empowering excellent uniform desalination performance over extended periods of time is exploited. This 3D superhydrophilic graphene oxide solar evaporator design ensures stable water supply by the enhanced self-driving liquid capillarity and absorption at the evaporation interface as well as efficient vapor diffusion. Meanwhile, the polyanionic electrolyte functionalization implemented via layer-by-layer static deposition of polystyrene sodium sulfonate effectively regulates/minimizes the flux of salt ions by exploiting the Donnan equilibrium effect, which eventually hinders local salt crystallization during long-term operation. Stable evaporation rates in line with the literature of up to 1.68 kg m h are achieved for up to 10 days in brine (15‰ salinity) and for up to 3 days in seawater from Hangzhou Bay in the East China Sea (9‰ salinity); while, maintaining evaporation efficiencies of ≈90%. This work demonstrates the excellent benefits of polyanionic electrolyte functionalization as salt resistance strategy for the development of high-performance solar powered seawater desalination technology and others.
太阳能蒸发有助于从海水和废水中可持续且环保地生产淡水。然而，传统蒸发器在盐水中耐盐性差且腐蚀程度高，这使得它们在实际应用中的使用很少。为了克服这种不足，人们开发了一种聚阴离子电解质功能化策略，该策略能在较长时间内实现出色的均匀脱盐性能。这种三维超亲水氧化石墨烯太阳能蒸发器设计通过增强自驱动液体毛细作用和蒸发界面处的吸收以及高效的蒸汽扩散来确保稳定的供水。同时，通过聚苯乙烯磺酸钠的逐层静态沉积实现的聚阴离子电解质功能化，利用唐南平衡效应有效地调节/最小化盐离子通量，最终在长期运行过程中阻碍局部盐结晶。在盐水（盐度为15‰）中，稳定蒸发速率可达1.68 kg m⁻² h⁻¹，持续长达10天；在东海杭州湾的海水中（盐度为9‰），稳定蒸发速率可达1.68 kg m⁻² h⁻¹，持续长达3天，同时保持约90%的蒸发效率。这项工作证明了聚阴离子电解质功能化作为一种耐盐策略对于开发高性能太阳能海水淡化技术及其他技术具有显著优势。
