Water. Desalination + reuse
Issue link: https://fhpublishing.uberflip.com/i/670678
PROJECTS | 16 | Desalination & Water Reuse | May-June 2016 EmiRaTES Plan fOuR dESalinaTiOn PlanTS The Emirates' Federal Electricity and Water Authority (Fewa) is to build four desalination facilities over the next ten years at a cost of more than Dh 3 billion (US$ 750 million) to produce 600 Ml/d. Fewa director general, Mohammed Saleh said expected water needs were to hit 1,000 Ml/d by 2030. "Fewa, to supply this amount, is to build four sea water desalination stations, worth Dh3.220 billion," reported regional newspaper Khaleej Times. "The first of these stations, worth Dh 950 million (US$ 260 million) is to be built in the emirate of Umm Al Quwain in the second half of this year and begin operation in 2020 with a daily capacity of 180 Ml." Saleh was reported to have said a second station, worth Dh 660 million (US$ 170 million) was planned in the emirate of Ajman in the first quarter of 2017 to start operation in 2020 with a daily capacity of 120 Ml. A third station, identical in size and cost to the second, was planned for Ras Al Khaimah in the first quarter of 2022 with operation starting in 2026. "The fourth station, worth Dh 950 million, is to be built in the first quarter of 2019 and start operation in 2023 with a daily capacity of 180 Ml but the location of this station will be determined later as per need," said Saleh. SanTa BaRBaRa fORCEd TO REThink SuBSuRfaCE inTakE Plan The city of Santa Barbara has decided to rethink plans to install a subsurface ocean intake for a desalination plant expansion after a study revealed that the process would either be infeasible or inadequate. The study found that six different proposed options for subsurface extraction were not suitable. The report found that they were unable to produce the required amount of water or had major design and construction flaws. The city council said in a report: "While none of the sub surface intake alternatives met the study's objectives, the information developed as part of this work will provide insight into the city's future water supply planning efforts." The council concluded it would have to consider "alternative supply options" including potable reuse and desalination production "outside of drought conditions." The city commissioned the study after protesters argued that the existing open water intakes at the Charles E Meyer desalination plant were lethal to sea life. The study was required under Santa Barbara's National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit. The city based its study on an annual potable water production of 12,500 Ml. The existing plant is designed to produce about 4,000 Ml a year. RWl-lEd mExiCO SEaWaTER dESalinaTiOn PROJECT STaRTS COnSTRuCTiOn A consortium of RWL Water Group and Mexico's Libra Ingenieros Civiles and RJ Ingenieria has begun construction of 22,000 m 3 /d reverse osmosis (RO) seawater desalination plant in Mexico's Baja California. Under the public private partnership between Baja California state and the consortium struck in November past year, the consortium will finance and deliver the US$ 32 million project through a build- own-transfer contract. RWL Water be project manager, provide all the process design and process equipment, and operate the plant under a 30-year agreement. Libra Ingenieros Civiles has been responsible for local agency permitting and provided design and equipment while RJ Ingenieria will design and carry out the civil engineering works. The contract to build the plant in the important, export-produce agricultural region of San Quintin some 240 km from the San Diego border is understood to be the first approved under Baja California's recently struck public-private partnership law. The facility is one of two similarly-sized RO plants under construction in Baja California. The other is in about 150 km away in Ensenada and scheduled to open in April 2017. And Baja California is looking into a second public-private partnership to build a third, much larger desalination plant. ORangE COunTy REaffiRmS BaCking fOR hunTingdOn PlanT California's Orange County board of supervisors has reaffirmed its support for a proposed US$ 1 billion desalination plant at Huntington Beach despite a forecast fall in anticipated water demand growth. The county's municipal water district has estimated in a recent report that demand in 2040 will be 17% under previous projections. According to local press, environmental activists have leapt on the forecast as support for their assertion that the plant is unnecessary. But the board of supervisors has urged the California Coastal Commission to approve the desalination plant project's final permit. In its report, the water district said the county's annual water demand would fall by 113,000 Ml. The proposed desalination plant's annual output would be 70,000 Ml. Project developer, Poseidon Water, needs one last permit to achieve full approval for the 200 Ml/d Huntingdon Beach plant. Poseidon insists the plant would provide drought-proof control to the region's water supply. anTigua SEaWaTER dESalinaTiOn PlanT POiSEd fOR STaRT West Indies island, Antigua is currently testing a reverse osmosis seawater desalination facility which could come on stream in March. The Antigua Public Utilities Authority (APUA) said the 2 Ml/d plant, at Pigeon Point, "will immediately service the Falmouth, English Harbour and Piccadilly and will aid in the ongoing water rationing, following more than two years of drought conditions." In October, last year, the cabinet of Antigua and Barbuda agreed to provide US$ 100,000 to APUA to complete the installation of the plant at Nelson's Dockyard. EvOqua PilOT ShOWS ElECTROChEmiCal mOdulES viaBlE Evoqua has completed a pilot of its Nexed electrochemical desalination modules at the Brackish Groundwater National Desalination Research Facility in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The pilot tested a variety of brackish water feed sources provided by the research facility. Its findings, according to Evoqua, demonstrated the viability of the company's electrochemical desalination technology across the range of brackish sources. The results have led Evoqua to develop a larger pilot using production Nexed modules that can be utilized to demonstrate the technology at facilities across the world, the company said.