Water. Desalination + reuse
Issue link: https://fhpublishing.uberflip.com/i/86284
Decentralised RO plants serve Indonesian rural areas _________ Torben Revald, Sales Manager, AqSep A/S, Denmark ___ Editor's Note: Danish pump/RO company Danfoss launched its small-scale desalination unit, the Watercube 2, in 2009. The mini-plant was built round Danfoss pumping and energy- recovery technology. The company then spun off this technology into a new company AqSep, which removed the attractive packaging and relaunched the machine as the WM9000E. The new model has a very functional design, was made for very easy maintenance and yet is compact and lightweight. This article describes how the WM9000E has now found favour in Indonesia due to its lower cost in remote areas compared with piped systems. A TOTAL of 84 "drinking water filling stations", using small-capacity reverse-osmosis desalination systems, have been constructed for rural coastal areas and in small remote islands in Indonesia. The water filling stations, which have been provided by various government departments, are thought to provide drinking water only. Despite Indonesia's high rainfall, which averages 180–320 cm over the year in the lowlands, the groundwater in many coastal areas and small islands remains salty throughout the year and is therefore unsuitable for drinking purposes. This has left a number of remote, small communities in a difficult situation with respect to drinking water supply. The traditional, centralised approach to such a technical issue would be to construct a piped water supply scheme that would utilise fresh water resources further inland, if available. However, construction of such piped water schemes in remote locations is not only time-consuming but also very capital intensive. The high capital investments derive from the long transmission mains likely to be needed, the structures for treatment works, pumping stations and water storage facilities, along with numerous other piping works. The costs of transporting pipes, valves and building materials long distances by land, sea, and sometimes even by air, further add to the capital requirements of piped water supply schemes in remote locations. With the challenges presented by the salty ground water resources and with the traditionally very high costs of piped water supply schemes, special measures were called for to make these projects technically and financially feasible. Therefore, it was decided to adopt a decentralised technological option, the drinking water filling station. Figure 1: Water filling station in a remote fishing village, Indonesia May-June 2012 | Desalination & Water Reuse | 33 | TECHNOLOGY