Hydranautics' membranes provide boron rejection at Cypriot desal plant
OCEANSIDE, CA, Dec. 3, 2004 -- Hydranautics, a leading global membrane technology specialist, provided 5,760 SWC3 membranes for the 14 mgd (51,000 m3/d) open intake seawater desalination plant in Larnaca, Cyprus.
The plant was awarded in February 1999 to IDE Technologies Ltd., of Ra'anana, Israel, with the build-own-operate-transfer (BOOT) contract for desalinated water by the Water Development Department of the Ministry of Agriculture, Cyprus. Construction began later that year and was completed in March 2001. Since then, Hydranautics' SWRO membranes have been producing potable water with a boron specification of less than 1 parts per million (ppm).
Larnaca is the largest desalination facility in Cyprus and one of the only plants in the world that successfully meets such stringent boron rejection requirements. The plant consists of six seawater trains, each with 120 pressure vessels, eight Hydranautics' SWC3 membrane elements per vessel. The SWC3 membrane elements have 89% nominal boron rejection. After two years of operation the membranes produce the required quality and quantity of treated water.
Hydranautics' ongoing commitment to research and development of new membrane technology lead to the development of the high temperature, and highest rejection membrane, the SWC4. The new SWC4 offers a nominal salt rejection of 99.8%, a flow of 5,500 gallons per day (gpd) and boron rejection and 92% boron rejection when operated at standard test conditions with a pH of 7.
Hydranautics chose to gradually replace some of the SWC3 elements with its new higher boron rejection SWC4 membranes. The SWC4 elements now provide optimal performance in Larnaca's cutting edge system designed by IDE and Hydranautics which contains a partial second pass that operates up to 25% of the overall flow from the first pass when the water temperature ranges between 15-30ºC (59-86ºF) to ensure the required quality standards.
The Larnaca plant, with Hydranautics membranes, has been providing purified water to approximately 200,000 citizens on the island of Cyprus in the south east Mediterranean for over two years. Despite technical challenges of high boron rejection requirements, the plant has run successfully 100% of the time satisfying the stringent end-user water quality standards. IDE and Hydranautics have also successfully teamed up on three other plants, all in Israel; the 2.6 mgd (10,000 m3/d) plant in Eilat, and smaller Ashdod and Dead Sea Works projects.
About Hydranautics
Hydranautics (www.hydranautics.com or www.membranes.com), of Oceanside, Calif., manufactures water purification equipment using membrane separation technology. Its products are used worldwide for a variety of applications, from seawater desalination, to surface water treatment, to agricultural irrigation. The company, founded in 1963, is a subsidiary of Nitto Denko.
About IDE Technologies
IDE Technologies Ltd. (www.ide-tech.com), founded in 1965, provides environmentally-friendly, efficient, and economical water solutions. Recognized as a world leader in low temperature distillation, the company specializes in the design, development and manufacture of sophisticated desalination plants and equipment, including saline water desalination processes, water treatment and purification of industrial streams (also zero discharge), heat pumps, and ice machines. IDE offers its clients advanced low-temperature evaporators and membrane systems designed to convert sea and brackish water into pure (potable or distilled) water for drinking and industrial purposes; low energy brine evaporators designed to concentrate industrial effluent streams, recover and recycle valuable materials and reduce effluent disposal problems; as well as ecologically-friendly heat pumps and ice machines, generating heating and cooling at reduced energy consumption. The company also specializes in cogeneration projects with combined power and water production.
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