Seawater Battery System Design
Problem statement
It’s the year 2024. And yet, nearly 10% of the world’s population is still without electricity and an even greater percentage represents those who cannot afford this provision.[1] In addition to these disparities, approximately 25% of the world is without safe drinking water.[2] These people, unlike Americans in the U.S., have no access to lighting, clean water or cooking, the internet’s vast database of knowledge, and are more prone to water borne illnesses. To alleviate these issues, a lot of governmental money can be spent on infrastructure to supply these sources of clean water or electricity. However, what if there were cheap, or even profitable solutions to providing these necessities to the remaining percentages of the world. Well according to recent research, the development of Seawater Battery (SWB) technology has led to cheap desalination-battery hybrid systems.[3] SWBs are energy storage systems that use seawater to provide low-cost, long-duration energy storage needed to overcome intermittent challenges with wind and solar energy. In recent years, SWB technologies have been proposed including those providing desalination and sodium production. To date, no systems have been designed or demonstrated that are capable of providing energy storage, desalination, and sodium production simultaneously. To enhance cost efficiency and potentially generate value, this project will aim itself at the combined implementation of seawater desalination and sodium extraction in an energy storage system. The project will explore the techno-economic aspects of such a system in addition to developing design options for a practical system of this kind. [1] H. Ritchie, P. Rosado, and M. Roser, “Access to Energy,” Our World Data, Jan. 2024, Accessed: Sep. 23, 2024. [Online]. Available: https://ourworldindata.org/energy-access [2] H. Ritchie, F. Spooner, and M. Roser, “Clean Water,” Our World Data, Jan. 2024, Accessed: Sep. 23, 2024. [Online]. Available: https://ourworldindata.org/clean-water [3] M. Son, S. Park, N. Kim, A. T. Angeles, Y. Kim, and K. H. Cho, “Simultaneous Energy Storage and Seawater Desalination using Rechargeable Seawater Battery: Feasibility and Future Directions,” Adv. Sci., vol. 8, no. 18, p. 2101289, Sep. 2021, doi: 10.1002/advs.202101289.
Team members 
Zack Bath – facilitator
Kwajean Moyong – communicator
Alex Aune – accountant
Alex Aune – admin
Client
Eric Kazyak