"do traditional desalination techniques require more energy than boiling the equivalent amount of water?" No, far less, because the end product is condensed li

"do traditional desalination techniques require more energy than boiling the equivalent amount of water?" No, far less, because the end product is condensed liquid water (not vapor). When* the desalination method is distillation (evaporating + re-condensing), the heat used to evaporate water is released again when the steam is condensed, and can be recovered and reused. E.g. [1]. The real-world figure wikipedia cites is about 90 MJ/m^3, compared to about 2,250 MJ/m^3 for boiling water at STP [2]. The theoretical limit from thermodynamics -- the minimum energy needed to separate salt and water -- is about 3 MJ/m^3 for seawater [3] (or [4-5]). *(as opposed to methods like reverse osmosis [6], which is forcing water through a filter with atom-sized holes -- no boiling involved) [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-stage_flash_distillation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-stage_flash_distillation [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enthalpy_of_vaporization#Other_common_substances http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enthalpy_of_vaporization#Other_... [3] http://http://www.sandia.gov/water/docs/MillerSAND2003_0800.pdf http://http://www.sandia.gov/water/docs/MillerSAND2003_0800.... [4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enthalpy_change_of_solution http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enthalpy_change_of_solution [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seawater http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seawater [6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_osmosis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_osmosis