Saudi- Experts call for 'greener' desalination technology 

(MENAFN - Arab News) The Kingdom must upgrade desalination technology to meet a rising demand for water and reduce the carbon footprint left by decades of use of oil, a panel of industry experts said while debating the issue on Tuesday.

Discussing the issue during a session on the future of green desalination on the final day of the Saudi Water & Power Forum 2011, the panelists said the most likely types of new technology being examined are solar and nuclear energy versus gas and oil, because they are energy sources that are much cleaner and more efficient.

"Some new forms of technology such as membrane installation has been researched and can reduce the carbon footprint to 1.5 Kg CO2/m3 while solar energy is even less, reducing it to 1.0 Kg CO/m3," said Dr. Corrado Sommariva, managing director of ILF.

He further proposed that the easiest way forward for the Middle East is to follow the same plan used in Europe concerning renewable resources.

"European governments provided incentives for countries to purchase resources at market prices and resell them to neighboring countries. I commend Saudi Arabia on pushing ahead with technical research and development but it will only result in academic results if action is not implemented to follow through," Sommariva added.

Concerning utilization of research and development, the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) said they are involved in launching a solar-powered desalination pilot project.

"Each of the phases of the program are each expected to take about three years each to complete and aims at developing a desalination program that reduces the use of chemicals using solar power instead of fossil fuel," said Gary Amy, director of the Water and Desalination Center at KAUST, adding that protecting the Red Sea and its species is a key element.

Discussing reasons why more industries such as those in the Kingdom must upgrade technologically to become "greener," Vincent Baujet, CEO of Sidem, said:

"Consider using renewable resources such as solar energy versus oil to run a plant. In a year we would have to burn approximately 900,000 barrels of oil which will largely increase costs that are not justifiable when cheaper sources of energy are becoming available such as solar energy."

He added that there is still work being done on the process but expects solar power to be the source of providing inexpensive energy in the future.

The industry experts also agreed that reducing the life of a desalination plant is also key to increasing productivity, reducing costs and protecting the environment.

"By industry standards 40 years is unacceptable. The average life of a plant considering technology is changing very rapidly and is around 22 years. Outdated, high cost materials used in the plants should also be upgraded. Titanium, for example, is more energy efficient as a heat conductor than steel or aluminum and has a much lower carbon footprint," Sommariva added.

Agreeing that titanium using a low temperature process that provides no corrosion yields a tremendous difference in investment costs, Paddy Padmanathan, president and CEO of Acwa Power, said: "Technical progression for 20 years toward the life of a plant is reasonable and upgrading to new technology would theoretically extend the life of the plant making it cleaner and more productive. This is the only logical answer for the future of desalination in Saudi Arabia."

The Kingdom is currently the world's largest producer of desalinized water, according to data from the Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC), with desalination meeting 70 percent of the country's daily water requirement. As demand increases, it is estimated that Saudi Arabia will have to spend 53.9 billion over the next 20 years to build, operate and maintain water projects.