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The main problem with distillation is it requires a phase change, which is extremely energy intensive especially in case of water.

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That energy can be recuperated.

It's true that you could build a condenser and pump the steam through the next batch of water, but I doubt you will ever get anywhere near the efficiency you need to make it reasonable. I'd be incredibly happy to see any links that would prove me wrong, though!

The process is called Multiple Effects Distillation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple-effect_distillation

It is a commercially successful process. For example Hitachi have build 8 plants delivering a total of 8,600m3/day https://www.hitachizosen.co.jp/english/products/products011....

That's really cool. Thanks! I should point out, though, that I meant that I don't think you will get efficient enough to make solar power reasonable. You will notice that Hitachi's RO solution has higher power efficiency than the distillation solution. I'd be really curious to see how much power it actually uses, though... Unfortunately it doesn't say in their marketing material.

IANAP but this process will increase the entropy of the energy and result in it being more difficult to utilize

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