Oman Power and Water Procurement (OPWP) company has invited bids from consultancies to investigate the best sea-water intake and outfall location for two independent desalination projects.
Both projects – at Salalah and Sharqiya – will be built by the private developers that win the concession from the state-owned OPWP. The Salalah project will reportedly produce 100 Ml/d while the capacity of Sharqiyah project is yet undecided.
Both projects are expected to go on stream within four years. The last date to submit offers by companies for the “recirculation study” to identify best intake and outfall location is30 November. These new water projects, which are at an early stage of tendering, are for substantially enhancing availability of potable water in the country’s southern and northern regions. OPWP earlier floated another tender linked to the development of Salalah and Sahqiya independent water projects.
More than 20 consultancies are understood to have have submitted their bids in response to a separate tender for conducting a topographic survey, a geotechnical investigation and a bathymetric and environmental survey to identifying suitable locations for the Salalah and Sahqiya projects.
The demand for potable water in Salalah is projected to grow at 8% as peak water demand grows from 75,000 m³/d in 2013 to 132,000 m³/d in 2020. The growth in demand for potable water is fuelled by population growth and industrial development, including tourism projects.
In northern Oman, demand for water is forecast to grow 6% a year in the next five years to
349,000 m³/d in 2020. Last year OPWP forecast growth at only 3-5% in a seven-year outlook for power and water demand. The northern region is mainly divided into an interconnected zone and Sur zone. The interconnected zone includes Muscat, Al Batinah North, Al Batinah South and Buraimi in addition to Al Dhakhiliyah, Al Dhabirah and Sohar Industrial area. Al Sharqiyah North, Al Sharqiyah South and Masirah are also in the zone.