Developing technologies that can supply water and energy in a sustainable manner is essential in addressing resource scarcity of small communities. The main motivation of this article is to find, through the analysis of different study cases, the optimal design of an Open-Cycle, Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OC-OTEC) system. Specifically, we propose optimization formulations to determine the operation policy and sizing of the system while considering four conflicting objectives: minimizing the total annual cost, minimizing CO${}_2$ emissions, and maximizing the generation potential of the products derived from the operation of the OC-OTEC (water and energy). The formulation captures seasonal effects and restrictions on water and energy demands determined by the end-user as well as diverse technical, operational, and design restrictions. The proposed model is applied to a study area in the Pacific region of Mexico.

开发能够以可持续方式供应水和能源的技术对于解决小社区的资源短缺问题至关重要。本文的主要动机是通过对不同研究案例的分析，找到开放循环海洋热能转换 (OC-OTEC) 系统的优化设计。具体来说，我们提出了优化公式来确定系统的运营政策和规模，同时考虑四个相互冲突的目标：最小化年度总成本、最小化 CO${}_2$排放，并最大限度地提高 OC-OTEC（水和能源）运行所产生的产品的发电潜力。该配方捕捉了最终用户确定的对水和能源需求的季节性影响和限制，以及各种技术、操作和设计限制。所提出的模型应用于墨西哥太平洋地区的一个研究区域。