Large facilities with a high latent load—such as grocery stores, ice rinks, and natatoriums—can benefit from desiccant dehumidification. Instead of extracting moisture out of the air at the inefficient cooling coils, a dedicated system is installed with a desiccant and uses natural gas to regenerate (e.g., to drive the moisture out of) the desiccant wheel. The existing cooling coils are still used to handle the sensible load, which they can do quite efficiently. The manufacturers claim that it takes only 25 percent as much energy to cool with such a system, which is no doubt a best case; still, it is an example of the potential of a properly designed desiccant system in the right application.
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Excerpt from Energy Conservation Projects.