RIYADH — The engineering wing and the research institute at the Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC) has recently been investing the corporation's technical and engineering expertise and capabilities in applied research to continue its march forward in achieving more in order to put the Kingdom at the forefront of desalination industry leaders in the world. The investment is being done through the expansion of innovative design and implementation of a number of small mobile desalination plants with high energy efficiency as well as flexibility in operation and mobility. Currently, the work is underway to build the first of these stations with the involvement of the SWCC staff from the levels of design to implementation with the support of the local content. These stations will operate with reverse osmosis technology, with a daily production capacity starting from 2,000 to 10,000 cubic meters of desalination water. Progress in energy efficiency will be made during stages of development over the course of 18 months, and the first output will be made within the next three months to test and present a number of pioneering technologies that the Research and Desalination Technologies Institute has worked on. The new station will operate with modern systems created by a team of researchers at the institute, with the energy recovery device (ERD) wing at the helm, by using an advanced high-pressure pump (HPP). The use of these systems aims to reduce total energy to less than 2.45 kilowatt per hour and reduce the specific energy to less than 1.85 kwh, which means achieving world records of 3.2 for total energy and 2.3 for specific energy. The SWCC pointed out that all engineering and construction work in the new plant project will be undertaken through its advanced central workshops that are managed by its highly efficient Saudi staff. This is by taking advantage of modern technologies, especially ERD that works at 98.5 percent efficiency and HPP that works at over 90 percent efficiency.
