IDA extends award fellowship application deadline

The International Desalination Association (IDA) has extended to October 10 the applications deadline for its 2014-15 Fellowship Award.

The award will go to one desalination professional and IDA member who will relocate to Oman for an attachment with the host of the 2014-15 Fellowship Award Programme, the Public Authority for Electricity and Water (PAEW), located in Ruwi, Muscat. The award recipient will participate in a training project with PAEW for a mutually agreed time period.

“The IDA fellow acquires new, in-depth knowledge. The host agency benefits from the IDA Fellow’s experience, knowledge and exposure to best practices, which are shared with the support of the fellow’s own organization,” said IDA’s secretary general, Patricia A Burke.

The start date of the attachment will depend on the project on which the fellow will work. The IDA will name the fellow by the end of October and provide a specific timetable once details of the project have been confirmed.

The Fellowship Programme was launched in 2008 and comprises a monetary award of up to US$ 10,000 and an attachment with a host agency to work on a specific project.

To be eligible for the award applicants must be IDA members with eight to ten years of working experience in desalination and/or water reuse.

PAEW performs evaluates techniques for providing fresh water and power production in its role of activating government policy in securing electricity and potable water supplies to residential, industrial and commercial consumers.

The programme, according to the IDA, seeks to advance global expertise in desalination and water reuse designed to benefit not only the fellow and host agency, but also the industry at large. “This programme plays an important role in promoting education and fostering information exchange among industry professionals – two essential elements of IDA’s mission of supporting development of and promoting the use of desalination globally,” said Burke.

“The IDA Fellow becomes a conduit for knowledge transfer, by sharing his or her learning with their own organization, as well as with other fellow professionals through IDA’s publications or presentations at major IDA events,” Burke added.

The host agency for the programme is a high-profile public utility or research organization known for its leadership in desalination and desalination technologies.

Previous host agencies are: Singapore’s national water agency, PUB; Saudi Arabia’s Saline Water Conversion Corporation; Water Corporation and Murdoch University in Western Australia; the US Bureau of Reclamation; and Kuwait’s Ministry of Electricity and Water.

For further details and application guidelines visit www.idadesal.org or contact Darlene Seta at [email protected].