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DesalData Weekly - July 13th, 2016

Posted 13 July, 2016 by Mandy

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 Credit: International Middle East Media Center

This week, the Turkish Minister of Forestry and Water Affairs reported that Turkey will establish a $300 million (USD) desalination plant for water-deprived Palestinians.[1]  While the daily capacity of the newly planned facility is not clear—it may well exceed that of an existing EU-funded desalination plant which will eventually provide clean water for 150,000 Gazans (for whom more than 95% of the existing water supply is unfit for consumption).  According to the International Middle East Media Center, “the project is big-ticket” and several nations will provide financial contributions to the facility.[2]

The United States government’s development finance institution, OPIC (the Overseas Private Investment Corporation), has given an Impact Award to Algeria’s Hamma Seawater Desalination Plant.[3]  OPIC’s Impact Awards “recognize exceptional achievement in international private-sector development.”  In particular, OPIC has recognized the Hamma plant for its excellence in “critical infrastructure”: the reverse osmosis seawater desalination plant delivers 1.5 million Algerians in the town of Hamma with 200,000 cubic metres of clean water every day. 

The plant is the first reverse osmosis desalination plant in Africa to receive joint funding from the public and private sectors.  In 2008, General Electric and the Algerian Energy Company joined to create “a special project company,” called The Hamma Water Desalination SpA, in order to design, build, and own the facility (General Electric provides 70 percent of its financing, while the Algerian Energy Company provides 30 percent).  

 

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Credit: Jonathan Hodgson, My Shot/ published by National Geographic

 

In South Australia, farmers have questioned the State government’s decision to deny them access to desalinated water during dry periods.[4]  The cost-benefit analysis that drove the government decision is being questioned.  Gavin McMahon, the Chief Executive Officer of the Central Irrigation Trust, which serves as an intermediary between South Australia’s water department and irrigators, has said that water-scarcity issues of the recent past have adversely and disproportionately affected irrigators. McMahon stated that these irrigators require more assistance from the state.  Meanwhile, the South Australian Water Minster, Ian Hunter, has countered this claim with the assertion “that the Adelaide desalination plant was built to meet the critical water needs of the city”—not the farmers.

Currently, irrigators are “facing their lowest allocations in several years,” while the Adelaide desalination plant is running at 10 percent of its capacity.  Farmer Mark Doecke reported to ABC News Australia that it is in the best interest of the state to support South Australian irrigators: “‘We produce a lot of export-earning produce, which brings money into South Australia and the nation as a whole…From a state perspective, if you can make a resource available that keeps an area productive, then that’s what we should be looking at…[C]an we utilise the resource for the benefit of everybody in the state?’”

 

Meanwhile, in the United States, a new $411 million desalination plant in San Antonio, Texas will deliver 45,420 cubic metres of water daily to city residents.  Currently, the residential water supply derives primarily from the Edwards, Carrizo, and Trinity aquifers; although the San Antonio Water System also plans to tap the Wilcox Aquifer that is 1,500 feet below ground level.[5]  The desalinated water will become available this October.

 

 

 
[1] “Gaza: Turkey to Build Seawater Desalination Plant,” July 12, 2016, <http://imemc.org/article/gaza-turkey-to-build-seawater-desalination-plant/> accessed July 12, 2016.
[2] Since 2008, intensive, catastrophic warfare in Gaza has seen jets “bombing every square kilometre of the strip, inflicting damage onto reservoirs above and pipelines below.” Ibid.
[3]  For more information on OPIC, see <https://www.opic.gov/>. “Hamma Sewater Desalination Plant in Algeria Honored With OPIC Impact Award for Critical Infrastructure,” July 8, 2016, Water Online, <http://www.wateronline.com/doc/hamma-seawater-opic-impact-award-for-critical-infrastructure-0001> accessed July 11, 2016.
[4] Dijana Damjanovic, “Irrigators Frustrated at Cost-Benefit Study into Desalination Plant,” July 5, 2016, ABC News Australia, <http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-06/desalination-too-expensive-for-irrigators/7571680> accessed July 11, 2016.
[5] Selina Nadeau, “SAWS Prepares to Deliver Water from Desalination Plant,” ABC KSAT 12, July 12, 2016, <http://www.ksat.com/news/saws-prepares-to-deliver-water-from-desalination-plant> accessed July 13, 2016.

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