Source arabnews.com
RIYADH: Desalination is a workable way to obtain an abundance of water for cultivation and human consumption in areas with little rainfall. Nevertheless, the conversion of saltwater into freshwater is a well-known energy-intensive process.
In the Arabian Peninsula, where water is scarce, desalination does in fact play a major role in carbon emissions. For this reason, Saudi Arabia has been making investments in renewable energy to run its desalination facilities.
Sultan Al-Rajhi, a spokesman for the Saudi Water Authority, told Arab News that "using renewable energies for desalination is crucial as it contributes to reducing the operation's carbon footprint and water production costs."
He said that saltwater desalination is necessary to meet demand because freshwater resources are limited in an area where the population is expanding quickly.
Because of the desert climate, where surface water and natural rivers are uncommon, Saudi Arabia is dependent on the desalination of seawater, according to Al-Rajhi.
As a matter of fact, almost 75% of the water supply in the Kingdom comes from desalination.
"In order to meet the demand for population and economic expansion experienced in the Gulf region as a whole, investment is being made in seawater desalination.”
The Kingdom needs 5.5 billion cubic metres of freshwater annually on average. During the Hajj and Umrah seasons, when well over a million pilgrims from all over the world gather, there is an exceptionally great demand for water.
With a population of almost 37 million, the Kingdom ranks third globally in terms of water consumption per capita. About 84% of all water use is accounted for by agriculture alone.
Source arabnews.com
The intricate process of desalination entails purging seawater of salt and other contaminants. Adopting renewable energy sources, like solar electricity, to power these facilities has become crucial since the process uses a lot of energy.
"Saudi Arabia should prioritise innovative and renewable technologies to develop climate-resilient infrastructure for sustainable desalination," said Abdulaziz Daghestani, country director at Grundfos and area sales director of water utilities, to Arab News.
A Danish business called Grundfos collaborates with regional governments to offer creative pumping solutions for industrial operations, heating and cooling, wastewater treatment, and water supply.
Daghestani claims that using cutting-edge monitoring systems can improve efficiency and optimise desalination processes.
"We can enhance water management techniques and promptly adapt to meet the fluctuating growing demand for human consumption and agriculture by utilising real-time data and analytics," he stated.
The Ministry of Environment, Water, and Agriculture introduced the Qatrah programme (Arabic for "droplet") in 2020 with the goal of reducing excessive water use by getting rid of trash and promoting the preservation and utilisation of current freshwater supplies.
By 2030, the daily per-capita water use is expected to drop from 263 litres to 150 litres. In order to accomplish this, the ministry has developed a national framework known as the National Water Strategy.
But even with these initiatives to make water systems more sustainable, desalination is still a vital way to supply the demand for water, so finding sustainable energy sources and effective production methods is vital.
Situated in the Eastern Province of the Kingdom, the Al-Khafji Desalination Plant is the largest solar-powered water desalination plant in the world. It uses an eco-friendly and creative technique to meet the region's water needs.
The plant uses cutting-edge technology developed by the King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology to produce up to 90,000 cubic metres of freshwater per day.
During the pre-treatment stage of its unique Solar Saline Water Reverse Osmosis technology, an ultra-filtration procedure is used.
Source arabnews.com
Using a semipermeable membrane that only lets water molecules through while keeping out salt and other impurities, seawater is forced through it. After that, the cleaned water is gathered and distributed.
Over 7 million cubic metres of the freshwater produced by the plant have already been used since its opening in 2018.
Reverse osmosis technique is thought to have the lowest rates of carbon emissions because to the recent advancements in this field's growth, which have increased energy efficiency, according to Al-Rajhi.
"In comparison to thermal desalination systems, the rate of carbon emissions per cubic metre in certain desalination systems has been reduced to 91%."
There are other renewable energy sources besides solar that can be used to power the desalination process.
"This is on top of the potential use of hydraulic turbines to produce clean energy by converting the kinetic energy from the flow of water into electricity," Al-Rajhi stated.
In addition to addressing the high energy costs related to desalination, this move towards renewable energy also bolsters Saudi Arabia's commitment to sustainable development.
The UN Environment Programme's executive director, Inger Andersen, has commended the Kingdom for its water conservation programme, which is a crucial component of its environmental mission known as the Saudi Green Initiative.
Source arabnews.com
Prioritising "not over-extracting and being very wise around environmental management" is a wise move on the part of Saudi Arabia.
She told Arab News, "That is why we are quite impressed by the Saudi Green Initiative."
This shift to greener energy sources is the result of a calculated strategy to combat climate change, increase the Kingdom's energy efficiency, and lessen its reliance on fossil fuels.
Using renewable energy in desalination processes is a big step in the direction of producing water in a way that is more ecologically friendly and sustainable.
Source arabnews.com
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