The raw salt can be recombined with returning wastewater, so on condition that the expenses are made to properly balance the flows the problem of brine disposal

The raw salt can be recombined with returning wastewater, so on condition that the expenses are made to properly balance the flows the problem of brine disposal is not as big as usually depicted. However it is a very big problem if the authorities refuse to implement these appropriate measures. A more explicit way this type of technology as depicted in the article could be used: given access to multiple baths of different salinity, the energy recovered from mixing 2 strongly saline baths can be used to desalinate a less saline bath. Consider the following map (2.7 MB png): https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/images/2019/05/global_sea-surface_salinity/19390092-1-eng-GB/Global_sea-surface_salinity.png https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/im... Clearly tracts of land largely separating seas of different salinity like Spain / Morocco [or for example Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Honduras, Mexico] have access to 2 distinct salinities. So by recovering energy from dumping the Mediterranean salt into the Atlantic, the energy can be recovered to desalinate either Atlantic waters or other accessible baths of saline but lower salinity water, like a transformer. A second point: if sufficiently scaled up it could provide baseload or buffer the mismatch between energy production and consumption, however one ought to reflect on the consequences on the local ecosystem if the water baths are not contained in man-made receptacles.