Energy conversion method with water recovery

A process of continuously generating heat energy, cooling capacity and pure water from an available aqeuous feed medium, the process comprising:

• introducing a continuous flow of an aqueous liquid feed medium from a source at an initial temperature into at least one enclosed region maintained at an under-pressure below the boiling pressure of said medium at the initial temperature;
• evaporating part of the water in the aqueous feed medium inside the region by extracting at least a part of the heat of vaporization from the remainder of the aqueous medium;
• withdrawing water vapor evaporated from the feed medium in the region;
• compressing the withdrawn vapor to a predetermined output pressure;
• delivering at least part of said compressed withdrawn vapor as a first source of output heat energy and as a source of pure output water;
• and
• discharging continuously the cooled remainder of the aqueous feed medium from the region as a source of cooling capacity,
• wherein the improvement comprises:
• the step of withdrawing water vapor from the region comprises supplying a jet of ejecting steam for evacuating water vapor evaporated from the feed medium in the region into a combined flow with said jet of ejecting steam;
• and
• the step of compressing the withdrawn vapor comprises thermo-compressing the vapor by means of the ejecting steam jet in a converging-diverging throat to a first pressure, intermediate between the pressure maintained in the region and the final output pressure, and then mechanically compressing the combined thermo-compressed vapor and ejecting steam from the first pressure to the output pressure.