Reliable fresh water supplies from challenging water sources

The world's water consumption rate is doubling every 20 years, outpacing by two times the rate of population growth. It is projected that by the year 2025 water demand will exceed supply by 56%, due to persistent regional droughts, shifting of the population to urban coastal cities, and water needed for industrial growth. The supply of fresh water is on the decrease. Water demand for food, industry and people is on the rise.

Lack of fresh water reduces economic development and lowers living standards. Clearly, there is a critical worldwide need to better manage this increasingly valuable resource.

Desalination systems from GE Water & Process Technologies can make abundant fresh water both from seawater and from challenging brackish sources.

Seawater Desalination
Oceans make up 97% of the world’s supply of water. Desalination using seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) membrane technology has become a viable option for the development of new regional water supplies.

GE Water & Process Technologies is the world leader in the supply of reliable seawater SWRO membrane desalination systems. GE's desalination projects range in size from small 2,000 cubic meter/day (370 gpm) plants -- providing potable water to hotels and resort complexes -- all the way up to projects like the 200,000 cubic meter/day (53 MGD) Hamma Desalination Plant, the largest of its kind in Africa. Hamma supplies desperately-needed drinking water to over 20% of the population of Algeria’s capital city.

With over 20 years of seawater SWRO desalination operating and maintenance expertise, GE leads the industry in its practical knowledge of SWRO membrane design, SWRO membrane pretreatment design, SWRO membrane cleaning techniques, energy recovery devices and the selection of material of construction.

Brackish Water Desalination
Brackish water, containing minerals and salts typically less than 5,000 ppm total dissolved solids (TDS), can be economically treated with today's reverse osmosis (RO) and electrodialysis reversal (EDR) systems. Effective mineral and salt removal converts previously unusable waters to high-purity resources for drinking, irrigation or industrial process uses.

GE pioneered brackish water desalination in the early 1950s and continues to lead the way with cost-effective, environmentally friendly treatment systems for groundwater and surface water sources. Our global installed capacity includes approximately 250 mgd (950,000 m3/day) of EDR systems and 600 mgd (2.3 million m3/day) of RO systems.

EDR and RO systems are available in fixed land-based and mobile designs. GE designs and builds the systems and in many cases also operates them under full-service build-own operate contracts.