The Ras Al Khair project in Saudi Arabia has won the “Desalination Plant of the Year” award at the 2015 Global Water Awards.
The plant is owned by Saudi’s state-owned Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC) which had appointed Pöyry as engineer responsible for project management, design review and site supervision.
The plant has been expanded recently to add 240 Ml/d to its output under a SR 300 billion (US$ 80 billion) investment plan running for the next ten years to increase SWCC’s production of desalinated water by more than 44 per cent to 5,200 Ml/d in less than two years and on to 8,500 Ml/d by 2025.
The Ras Al Khair plant – the largest combined power and desalination facility in the world - includes multi stage flash and seawater reverse osmosis desalination and deploys the largest membrane plant in the Gilf of Oman. It also uses dissolved air flotation pre- treatment in converting more than 1 billion litres of seawater into potable water each day.