SCIENCE – A team of researchers from Monash University in Australia and the University of Texas at Austin have found a breakthrough solution to filter salt and metal ions from water. The researchers found that metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) can be designed to selectively filter both salt and ions. MOFs are remarkable next-generation materials that have the largest internal surface area of any know substance. Unfolded, a single gram of the material could theoretically cover a football field.  It is this intricate internal structure that...

PALESTINE – The Palestinian Water Authority has received tender and design documents for a new $600 million desalination plant located at Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip.  The project includes the construction of the plant and associated infrastructure, including a distribution network and pumping stations.

The project has thus far faced significant political and financial obstacles. The head of the Palestinian Water Authority, Mazen Ghuneim, reported that the utility has been working with donors and others to facilitate the entry of...

USA – Local leaders and port officials in Corpus Christi, Texas are looking to expand their water supply through desalination to support the city’s growing industrial sector. For some time now, officials have endeavored to utilize the plentiful saltwater on their shores for both industrial and residential use.^[1] The Texas Water Development board has already granted the city $2.75 million in credit to put towards desalination projects, and officials are now considering their options.^[2]

One option under consideration is for the Port of...

SOUTH AFRICA – The water supply for the city of Cape Town is expected to reach critical levels by April 2018, when the taps may have to be turned off for an indeterminate period of time.^[1] The City of Cape Town has stated that it will bring three desalination plants online in the first quarter of this year.^[2] However, only one of these projects—the V&A Waterfront desalination project—is on schedule for completion by February.^[3] The two other plants, located at Monwabisi and Strandfontein, are currently behind schedule.^[4] 

...

ABU DHABI’s Water and Electricity Authority (ADWEA) is reportedly planning to build the world’s largest water desalination plant.^[1] The facility will produce 757,000 cubic metres of water per day and will be located in the country’s Al Taweelah region, halfway between the cities of Abu Dhabi and Dubai. ADWEA will retain a 60 percent stake in the project, which will be developed in partnership with the private sector.

SPANISH officials plan to install new desalination capacity to ameliorate water scarcity for farmers and residents in...

Last week the China Overseas Port Holding Company inaugurated a new desalination plant at PAKISTAN’s Gwadar port.^[1]  The desalination plant produces around 1150 cubic meters of clean drinking water per day.^[2]  The Federal Minister for Ports and Shipping, Mir Hasil Khan Bizenjo, expressed the hope that the desalination plant will resolve Gwadar’s ongoing water crisis and stated that there are plans for additional desalination plants.^[3]

GHANA – The Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL) has shut down the Teshie-Nungua...

CHINESE officials plan to increase the nation’s seawater desalination capacity more than fivefold within the next three to five years.^[1]   This expansion will include the construction of roughly one-hundred plants concentrated in 16 coastal provinces and cities, according to a plan issued by the National Development and Reform Commission and the State Oceanic Administration.

By 2020 many of China’s 500 inhabited islands, which are increasingly facing water shortages, are also expected to rely on desalination as their primary source...

PERU - A Spanish consortium consisting of Tedagua and Cobra Instalaciones y Servicios has started construction on the Provisur water treatment project in Lima. The plant, which has a capacity of 12,960 cubic metres per day, will be the first in Peru to desalinate seawater for domestic use. In addition to the desalination plant, the $95 million project includes 260km of piping, a sewerage treatment plant and a 780m underwater discharge pipeline. The project will benefit 100,000 residents in four coastal districts on the southern...

In April 2017 Suez and Solvay formed an alliance to offer new solutions for water treatment in CHINA. Having developed a newly patented advanced oxidation process, they have won a contract to treat brine from a desalination facility located in Wanhua Chemical Industry Park in Yantai, Shandong Province.^[1]  The facility will produce 24,000 cubic metres of water per day. 

The facility’s water quality parameters include total nitrogen levels of less than 15 milligrams per liter; total organic carbon levels of less than 20 milligrams...

SOUTH KOREA’s Samsung Engineering has asked the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) to begin proceedings against Saudi Arabia over the cancellation of the Yanbu 3 Water and Power project.^[1]  The ICSID was founded by the Executive Directors of the World Bank in 1965 and mediates legal disputes between international investors.

Saudi Arabia’s Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC) cancelled its EPC contract with Samsung in January 2017 due to disagreements over project changes.^[2]  SWCC had...

EGYPT has started construction on the Ain Sokhna plant, which will have a capacity of 164, 000 cubic metres per day.^[1] Kamal El Wazir, head of the Egyptian Armed Forces Engineering Authority, confirmed last week that construction had commenced on the plant, which will support three other large desalination projects currently under construction in the Suez Canal Economic Zone.^[2]

The country’s contracted desalination capacity has increased tenfold in the past two years to a total of 700,000 cubic metres per day.  Egyptian officials plan...

SOUTH AFRICA –  A subsidiary of the PSG Group, Energy Partners, is investing in the desalination company GrahamTek with aspirations to turn the company into a multibillion-rand business.^[1]  Although PSG typically makes smaller initial investments in new businesses—it has already secured a 50 percent share in GrahamTek.^[2]

GrahamTek produces mobile plants that generate 3,000 cubic metres of fresh water per day. Each plant costs $3 million rand (roughly USD$210,900 dollars) and has a life-expectancy of about 25 years.^[3]

The company...

Despite ISRAEL’s strong desalination base, the nation still relies on rainfall to supplement its water supply.  Last winter, however, the country experienced a drought that diminished the multi-year average of rainfall by 71 percent, with weather forecasters now predicting a similarly arid season this year.  The Finance Ministry has accordingly asked the nation’s desalination facilities to increase their water output for the final months of 2017 until the end of 2018, with the state covering the cost of all additional water...

Last week at the IDA World Congress UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission introduced the world’s first guide to harmful algal blooms.^[1]

The guide was produced by the commission and the Middle East Desalination Research Centre and it was written with help from 63 world specialists.  Consisting of nearly a dozen chapters, key topics include the fundamental features of algal blooms; case studies with practical information for plant designers and operators; monitoring approaches such as remote sensing imagery that reveals...

PAKISTAN –  The China Pak Investment Corporation is set to build a new seawater desalination project in Pakistan.^[1]  The project will be located in Gwadar and produce 23,000 cubic metres of water per day for a community of 500,000 Chinese professionals who will move to the city by 2020.   

The facility is part of a much larger development project that comprises homes, parks, shopping and sports facilities, and an international school for children. It advances China’s plan of foreign direct investment known as the...

SPAIN has granted Morocco $14.3 million dollars to finance a seawater desalination plant that will supply water to the country's northeastern provinces of Al Hoceima and Nador.^[1]  The Spanish company of Tedagua has been contracted to build the facility. 

The plant supports the Moroccan government’s National Water Plan, “a benchmark strategy” for water policy formulated in 2015. ^[2]  The plan carries three key objectives: to provide universal access to drinking water and to improve the efficiency of the water supply network; to...

U.S.A. –  In northeastern Arizona, on the lands of the Great Basin Desert, nearly 40 percent of Navajo families lack access to running water.  The rainfall is minimal and the groundwater is contaminated with metals.  The recent donation of a mobile water treatment system to the STAR School, a public school located on tribal lands, will help to alleviate this crushing water-scarcity. ^[1]  

The mobile system is solar-powered and located on a school bus, where it draws water upwards from a well into a feed tank and then...

U.S.A. –  Later this month, the U.S. Department of Energy will publicize a new funding opportunity through its SunShot Initiative.  The funding will support the research, development, and demonstration of early-stage solar desalination technologies with the primary objective of promoting cost-efficient schemes.^[1]  

Established in 2011, the Sunshot Initiative aims to make possible low-cost solar energy for all Americans by 2020 through collaborative research and development efforts in the public and private sectors....

USA –  Since its opening in December 2015, California’s billion-dollar Carlsbad desalination plant has faced considerable difficulties.^[1]  Mechanical failures and regulatory hurdles have prevented the plant from fully completing the water orders it has received.^[2]  In 2016, for instance, the facility provided the San Diego Water Authority with 90 percent of its water order, compared with only 70 percent in 2017.  The plant has also acquired more than a dozen water pollution violations.^[3]

Poseidon Water and its parent...

DJIBOUTI’s Economy and Finance Ministry has commissioned a new 83-million Euro desalination facility.^[1]  The National Water and Wastewater Treatment Office will serve as project manager while the French engineering company Eiffage Génie Civil will develop the facility in a consortium with the Spanish water company Tedagua. 

Located in Doraleh, the facility will initially produce 22,500 cubic metres of water per day with plans to expand to 45,000 cubic metres of water per day.^[2] It is expected that the plant will be online...

MOROCCO –  Morocco’s secretary of state for water, Charafate Afailal, has said that seawater desalination is the “only recourse” to reduce the national water deficit for domestic, industrial, and agricultural purposes.^[1]  In Casablanca, officials are finalizing their plans for a desalination facility that will serve the city and the greater Casablanca-Settat region. 

By 2030, according to one estimate, Morocco will need to desalinate 425 million cubic metres of water per day to ensure supply.^[2]  The country is currently...

U.S. –  A water utilities project developed by Stanford University environmental engineers has been honored at the American Society of Civil Engineers Innovation Contest. Known as AquaCharge, the software program functions as an “optimization tool for enhancing water resiliency and sustainability”—by helping water management planners to make informed decisions about the operations and development of water reuse and stormwater systems.^[1] 

The program’s evaluation process includes analysis of several factors including the...

TUNISIA’s national water utility, SONEDE, will build a new seawater desalination plant along the country’s Mediterranean coast. SONEDE has acquired a loan of $328 million from the Japan International Cooperation Agency to build the plant.  The facility will produce 100,000 cubic metres of water per day for the country’s second largest city, Sfax.^[1]

Home to 600,000 people, Sfax experienced a water shortage in 2017—and is expected to fall short of its daily demand for water in the amount of 150,000 cubic metres by 2030.  The project...

OMAN –  The Oman Power and Water Procurement Company (OPWP) will soon develop a seawater desalination plant in the southern province of Dhofar.^[1]  The facility will be located in the city of Salalah and produce 100,000 cubic metres of water per day.^[2]  It is set to go online in 2022 as part of an ongoing initiative to nearly double the nation’s water supply between 2016 and 2023 (at a rate of 9 percent per year).

U.S.A. –  Atmocean, Inc., a renewable energy company, utilizes hydro-power to provide reverse osmosis...

MYANMAR – The Wellthy Corp, a subsidiary of the Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation, has formed a joint venture with Myanmar Water Engineering & Products to provide a variety of water services in the southeastern Asian country.^[1] The company’s new business follows the completion of demonstration projects on the waters of the Yangon River—which have provided information pertinent to the equipment, maintenance, and technical expertise that is necessary for large-scale commercial operations.

Wellthy’s expansion into Myanmar follows its...

ISRAEL – India’s national government is looking to Israel for its expertise in water management and recycling.^[1] Last week, officials from India took steps toward developing a wide-ranging partnership with their Israeli counterparts. India’s Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Israel’s Ministry of National Infrastructure, Energy, and Water Resources. And the state utility, Uttar Pradesh Jal Nigam, also signed an MoU with the Israeli ministry.^[2]

To mark the occasion, Narendra Modi has travelled...

SINGAPORE – The country’s new Keppel Marina East desalination plant will push the typical perimeters of industrial design.^[1]  PUB, Singapore’s national water agency, and Keppel Infrastructure will design a 20,000 square metre green space on the roof of the treatment plant, which will be located underground.  This green space will serve as a recreational area.

The plant will be a large-scale dual-mode facility that will desalinate both seawater and freshwater from the Marina Reservoir.  This structure allows the plant to save...

EGYPT – The Engineering Authority of the Armed Forces is planning to build four seawater desalination plants.  Major General Kamel al-Wazir, head of the EAAF, announced that three of the facilities would each have a capacity of 150,000 cubic metres of water per day.^[1] They will be located in Al Alamain, Al-Jamila, and East Port Said, and reportedly financed in cooperation with French and German companies. A fourth facility will be located in Najila, with an initial capacity of 5,000 cubic metres per day.

In 2018, the Ain Sokhna water...

MUMBAI – To alleviate water scarcity in Thane the Mumbai Metropolitan Region will soon launch a desalination pilot project.^[1]  The facility will desalinate 20,000 cubic metres of brackish water from Vasai Creek, and discharge brine into the stream after diluting it with water from the Kopri sewage treatment plant.  The Thane Municipal Corporation has organized the project as a public-private partnership, and allocated a site for the plant in Kalwa, in the outskirts of Mumbai.^[2]

The company is also in the process of establishing a...

BAHAMAS – GE Water and Process Technologies is building a seawater reverse osmosis desalination plant in the Caribbean Island of Eleuthera.^[1] The company has entered into a 15-year build, own, operate agreement with Water and Sewerage Corporation Bahamas. The plant, which is GE’s fourth facility in the Bahamas, will produce 2,728 cubic metres of water per day.  It is expected to go online in the first quarter of 2018.^[2]

BRAZIL – Suez has signed a memorandum of understanding with Compendia de Agua e Esgoto do Caerá, the water...