Degrémont eyes desalination contracts in Mexico

French water services company Degrémont is seeking to participate in a public tender to construct a desalination plant in three Mexican states according to a Mexican state news outlet.

The French firm’s Mexican subsidiary, Degrémont Mexico, is reported to be looking at tenders in the states of Sonora, Baja California and Baja California Sur, in the state capital La Paz.

According to figures from Mexico’s water commission Conagua, desalination projects in the country’s northern region total some US$ 716 million.

Degrémont has been active in Mexico for some four decades. It began operations in 1999 at a desalination plant in Oaxaca state after winning a contract to finance, design, construct and operate the project for Mexico’s state-owned oil firm Pemex.

Desalination projects in Mexico started gathering momentum after the 2007 completion of the Los Cabos facility.

Degrémont – the water services arm of French multinational Suez Environnement – operates in Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Colombia. The company provides desalinated industrial water for Minera Escondida in northern Chile’s Antofagasta region, operator of the largest copper mine in the world.