|Here is the distillation tank in the Engine Room of the Kennedy|
Capt Lima joined the Kennedy in New Orleans. Capt Lima is the Vice President of Academic Affairs, and a licensed Chief Engineer, he is training the cadets in Marine Engineering, As Captain Lima explained, "With over 700 onboard the vessel, water is precious. Water is necessary for cooking, cleaning and the boiler. Fresh water can be produced by one of two methods. One is a distillation process where salt water is boiled under low pressure and the steam is condensed resulting in very pure water. The other method is through reverse osmosis where water is pumped at very high pressure through membranes which filter the salt from the water. Water from the reverse osmosis system cannot be used in the boilers".
We can see this process in the classroom where distillation of salt water can be done on a small scale using the sun. Solar water distillation operates on the basic principles of the water cycle -- evaporation, condensation, and precipitation -- to purify water for drinking and other uses. The device used in distillation is called a still, which consists of a basin in which the source liquid is heated, a condenser in which the heated vapor is cooled back to the liquid state, and a collection vessel in which the purified liquid is collected.
|Click on this picture to see solar distillation video|
Try this activity to get salt from salt water.
Design and build a desalinization tank
Learn more about the use of reverse osmosis in making bottle water.