DESAL PROGRESS

The boom in the Middle East, however, continues to be driven by the desalination market.

As one project is successfully closed another takes its place, barely giving developers the chance to catch their breath. On the IWPP front, the big projects of 2005 have been Taweelah B, Ras Laffan B, Shoaiba, Marafiq and Rabigh. More are due to follow in the second half of the year at Hidd, Fujairah, Barka, Shuqaiq and Taweelah. The Qataris have also announced plans for additional power and water capacity, which will most likely be tendered on an IWPP basis.

There is no let-up in the number of government-financed desalination projects either. The Dubai Electricity & Water Authority (DEWA) said last month that new projects were in the pipeline to meet the emirate’s growing need for water. The Authority announced the award of the 1,200MW and 250,000m3/d Jebel Ali L Phase 2 project to a consortium of Hyundai Engineering & Construction and Italy’s Fisia Italimpianti. DEWA’s next water project at Jebel Ali is the M station, which will have a capacity of 272,765m3/d and a power output of up to 2,000MW.

The Ministry of Energy in Kuwait is planning a 136,500m3/d seawater RO plant at Shuwaikh and has invited bids from contractors by the end of August. Our Libyan sources also report that the General Electricity Corporation of Libya (GECOL) is planning a 20,000m3/d extension to an existing 10,000m3/d plant at Soussa. An RFP is apparently ready but has not yet been issued.

All this is good news for plant and equipment suppliers, which are benefiting from ever bigger order books. Saudi Arabia’s Amiantit Group picked up a series of orders in the first half of 2005 for its pipes and fittings. Orders came from Kuwait for the Subiya desalination plant project and from Oman for the Sohar desalination plant. The company
also supplied pipes for wastewater projects in Iraq and Jordan (As Samra) as well as a water transmission project at Al Hasaka in Syria. Switzerland’s Calder, the licencee for the DWEER energy recovery system used at Ashkelon and Singapore, also picked up new orders. Six of its energy recovery turbines will be installed at Israel’s 82,000m3/d Palmahim SWRO plant and the company has also received orders for two large turbines for Bahrain’s Ras Abu Jarjur plant.

But it has not been all good news on the desal front. Abu Dhabi’s ADWEA called its unit managers (including those working at its IWPPs) in last month to discuss a bromate contamination problem it has recently discovered. The carcinogen has been detected at concentrations of 10 times the World Health Organisation’s recommended maximum in the Authority’s water (although even at that level it would have to be used for 60 years to have a measurable impact on the risk of causing cancer). Bromide in seawater can be converted to bromate during the disinfection process used at some of Abu Dhabi\'s desalination facilities. Systems are being adapted to remove the problem (CH2M Hill is said to be advising). ADWEA is one of the most sophisticated desalination authorities in the world. One wonders how widespread the problem might be among authorities who are less assiduous in their water quality measurements?