Even if the water produced by this process is like distilled water(without the minerals needed for drinking water), if it is cheap enough, and scalable enough, countries like India, Arab countries and northern African countries could theoretically pump in such clean water into the ground and mix it with the little fresh water they have in their land…
Setup the system to produce a 100 million liters per day, and pumping into ground inland should still replenish the ground water levels enough while earth does its thing to add the needed minerals…
Heck use such water to plant trees where it would not have been possible otherwise…
This. It may seem like wishful thinking, but the problem of desertification is so immense that we ought to approach any potential remedy with first principles and determine feasibility.
Could passive desalination be a way to bootstrap local ecosystems in arid environments to a degree where it would be self-sustaining?
Heck use such water to plant trees where it would not have been possible otherwise…