Background of the Invention
The desire to make drinkable, potable water out of seawater has existed for a long time. Several approaches can be taken to remove the salt and other chemicals. Reverse Osmosis method uses pressure to force salty feed water against membranes which allows the relatively salt free water to pass through, but not much of the salts or other minerals. But due to the high production and capital costs, desalination systems are not widely used for making large scale supplies of public drinking water.
Efforts have been made to increase the efficiency of reverse osmosis systems in general and specifically, with respect to a desalination system, to lower operating and fixed costs. Some efforts have been directed at the improving the efficiency of the filtration systems, other efforts have been directed at the design and application of filter membranes, multi stage filtering and nano-filtration methods-Other efforts have also been directed at improving the efficiency of other aspects of a reverse osmosis system. For example, some efforts have been directed at the membrane filtration system replacement method by monitoring the sitt density and at the application of particular feed water pressures.
Each of these efforts may increase the efficiency of the desalination system, but these efforts may not sufficiently reduce the cost of the system for use for public ware supply. What is needed is a desalination system that processes seawater into potable water more cost effectively for use for public water supply.
In this context, the present invention is directed towards developing a process which aims at reducing the cost, simplifying the steps and improved efficiency.
Description of the Invention:

A Unique portable, collapsible & low cost Intake device (1 of Fig 1) comprising of bar screen mesh screen (< 10 Sq cm), dead weight, floating buoy and a mooring hook is suspended below the surface the Sea water surface to draw the sea water for purification. In this stage, the large sized particulate matter < 10 Sq cm, fish & other Impurities are prevented from entering the system. This also enables the elimination of Oil, grease and other floating matter in the sea from entering the process of purification without any additional equipments like Oil Separators.
From this Intake Device the raw water is pumped by either a vertical multistage centrifugal pump (2 of Fig 1), or a rotary pump or a horizontal pump depending on the source of raw water and likewise construction material is either cast iron, stainless steel & its higher grades, haste alloy, nickel aluminum bronze and others selected based on the corrosivity of the raw water.
This is then conveyed into a filter( 3 of Fig 1) which is rated to remove particulate matter above 50 microns .This is then followed by a similar apparatus { 4 of Fig 1) where a finer step of filtration is incorporated and suspended particles above 20 micron size are eliminated.
This is then led into an adsorption filter (5 of Fig1) with appropriate filtration media originating from Coal, Charcoal. Wood, Coconut, and Zinc or copper wherein the organic matter contained in the raw water is removed besides any oxidizing chemicals or trace toxic impurities.
This filtered and treated water is then led to a micron cartridge fitter (6 of Fig1) wherein conventional spun or melt blown synthetic or natural fiber cartridges are used and particles above 5 microns are removed here.
From here the water is split into 2 streams the stream A is taken into a high pressure pump (7 of Fig1) which may be either positive displacement, multistage centrifugal , rotary type in either 316L.hastealloy, Nickel aluminum bronze or Ceramic Material of construction and the raw feed water entering at a pressure in

the range of 1 to 5 kg/cm2 at the inlet is boosted to upto 98 kg/cm2 to get the desired driving pressure required to overcome the pressure requirements for hyper filtration to occur.
The second stream B is led into an energy saving device (8 of Fig1) at an inlet pressure of 1 to 5 kg/cm2 wherein the pressure is boosted to a maximum of 94 kg/cm2 after which this is led into ( 9 of Fig 1) which is a pressure booster constructed in appropriate materials of construction wherein the feed water of upto 94 kg/cm2 is boosted further to 98 kg/cm2.
The two streams A & B now with a balanced & equal pressure of upto 98 kg/cm2 are combined to form a common streann C which is led into the pressure vessel (10 of Fig 1)) housing the hyper filtration membranes (11 of fig 1) where hyper filtration at a Ievel of upto 0.00015 microns takes place. Herein the streams are split into two stream D and Stream E, stream D which is upto a ratio of 90 % consists of pure water in which the impurities existing in the raw water are reduced by upto 98 % and is then led to a treated water storage tank.
Stream E which is upto a ratio of 80 % of the total feed water is led to apparatus 8 at a pressure of upto 97 kg/cm2 and exits at a pressure of less than 3 kg/cm2 and is led to disposal or other use where possible( Stream F).
Chemical Dosing pumps (12 - 18 of Fig 1) are provided in the process to control scaling, organics. bacteria, pH and chlorine levels..

CLAIM:
1. A process to convert Sea Water into potable water wherein the said process can handle feed waters with a dissolved solids level of 0 to upto 35,000 mg/ litre.
2. A process to convert Sea Water into potable water according to claim 1, wherein the said process has a portable, collapsible & low cost intake device comprising of bar screen mesh screen (< 10 Sq cm), dead weight, floating buoy and a mooring hook is suspended below the surface the Sea water surface is incorporated to draw the sea water for purification
3. A process to convert Sea Water into potable water according to claim 1, wherein the said process eliminates the requirement of conventional devices like clarifiers tube settlers, coagulant dosing, pressure sand fitters etc
4. A process to convert Sea Water into potable water according to claim 1, wherein the said process, incorporates self cleaning and requires no down time for backwash or replacement of filtration media
5. A process to convert Sea Water into potable water according to claim 1, wherein the Wherein the said process, incorporates the placement
. adsorption fitter after the elimination of 20 Micron and above particulate matter resulting in improved efficiency in adsorption rates and service cycles.
6. A process to convert Sea Water into potable water according to claim 1,
wherein the said process ,has a sequence of various unit operations
resulting in reduced space requirements, improved efficiency &
simplification of operating steps.
Date: Ramesh B Vishwanath
Attorney for the Applicant