Water. desalination + reuse

COMMENT | 4 | Desalination & Water Reuse | May-June 2014 (According to a 3rd party industry publication of desalination market.) publication of desalination market.) Tel: +734.241.3935 Fax: +734.241.5173 www.fedco-usa.com sales@fedco-usa.com Making fluid energy work for you FEDCO is a global leader in the manufacture of high-pressure pumps and energy recovery devices (ERDs) for brackish and seawater RO systems. FEDCO's seawater RO high pressure product line sets the standard for the lowest life cycle cost, from mega-scale to small system applications. We can be your single-source for single and multi-stage centrifugal pump and ERD packages. FEDCO's brackish water RO product line uses modular components for optimal cost, efficiency, and delivery. The low pressure units can be configured as a feed pump, energy recovery, integrated motor-assisted turbocharger, and brine-driven turbo-generator. F L U I D E Q U I P M E N T D E V E L O P M E N T C O M P A N Y , L L C 8 0 0 T E R N E S D R I V E M O N R O E , M I 4 8 1 6 2 U S A MSB MSB MSB MSB: HPP for BWRO : HPP for BWRO : HPP for BWRO : HPP for BWRO SWRO PACKAGE MSS & HPB MSD: All duplex SS HPB HPB HPB HPB: Mega scale ERD : Mega scale ERD : Mega scale ERD : Mega scale ERD HP-HEMI: HP-HEMI: HP-HEMI: HP-HEMI: Mega scale ERD Mega scale ERD Mega scale ERD Mega scale ERD and system control and system control and system control and system control and system control SSD SSD SSD SSD: Mega scale HPP : Mega scale HPP : Mega scale HPP : Mega scale HPP LP-HEMI: Integrated HPP and ERD LPD: Brine to electricity Contact us today to learn more about the world's most innovative RO pumping and energy recovery products. FOURTEEN YEARS in one job must seem like another world to many readers of D&WR, whose work seemingly takes them almost annually to another employer, another project, another country. But, come this summer, that is the time I would have been editor of the International Desalination Association (IDA)'s quarterly were this not to be my final issue. At the end of May I will be leaving D&WR and will join my daughter's company providing corporate communication services to clients in the global water industry. I think I must have been very lucky when Pat Burke, IDA secretary general, suggested me for the job, because those 14 years have seen the industry take an incredible leap forward. Boosted by both climate change and population growth, it has grown from a small, relatively insignificant sector of the worldwide water industry to a much more prominent and ever more crucial provider of water supply and reuse services in the future. Desalination projects are debated on tv news programs and are big stories in the financial media. In my first Editor's Corner, in the November/December 2000 issue, I wrote (without much current experience of the industry): "This is the challenge for the desalting community in the new millennium: to reduce the capital cost, maintenance needs and high energy dependence of desalination processes." And I'd never even heard of Energy Recovery Inc until they took an advertisement in that issue! Undoubtedly, all these things have been reduced over the years, some would say considerably. But many influential people outside the desalination and reuse sector have yet to be convinced, while the environmental sector is probably as sceptical as ever about the technologies, due to their expensive materials, still-high energy cost and disputed effects of brine disposal. For these reasons, it is good to see the IDA, and its new president, Abdullah Al- Alshaikh, taking on these challenges in his quest - his "dream" as he calls it - to make desalination sustainable. You can read my interview with the president on page 38, in which he says: "The number of desalination plants in the world is increasing drastically, but in some areas they have not even thought about desalination in the past. Now they are taking it seriously." So, both the industry and global circumstances have brought a response to another observation in my first leader: "… an industry like desalination should not just be confined to oil-rich countries, but should be spread throughout the world." That seemed far away then, but now it is on the threshold of realization. It's been fun; I'll see you around! Robin Wiseman A lot can happen in 14 years! eDitoR'scoRneR

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