Spanish clean energy and water company, Acciona, has forecast a surge in demand for desalination plants in Chile as the country’s copper mining industry expands.
“It’s going to take off,” Acciona director in Chile and Peru, Diego Pini told news agency Bloomberg. He said the company plans to bid on contracts to build municipal desalination plants to supply cities with potable water and to supply Chile’s copper mines.
The growing demand will start next year will be fuelled by new mining projects and government contracts to supply desalinated water amid a fifth year of drought, Pini said. He predicted “intensive use of desalination in the north of Chile.”