ABSTRACT
The shortage of quality water is one of the major challenges facing the world today. Demand for fresh water keeps growing as a result of the fast growth of population, urbanization, environmental changes, and pollution. Seawater desalination has attracted intensive interest in recent years and witnessed rapid development, largely promoted by the fast development of novel membrane materials, particularly those based on carbon nanomaterials including carbon nanotubes and graphene. The high mechanical strength, chemical stability, inherent nano-porosities, and nanochannels resulting from their unique atomic structures have rendered them promising materials for the formation of novel assembly for seawater desalination. This chapter presents the application of carbon nanomaterial-based membranes for seawater desalination. Various types of such membranes are introduced. The unique water transport behaviors through the nanochannels formed inside typical carbon-based nanomaterials are discussed. The modeling of seawater desalination by using these nanomaterials as filtration membranes in processes like reverse osmosis, forward osmosis, and capacitive deionization is highlighted. Novel conceptual devices based on the carbon-based nanomaterials for seawater desalination are also introduced.
