Operational Performance of a Seawater Desalination Plant: Case study: Chatt El Hilal Desalination Plant (Ain Temouchent)

Abstract

In Algeria, even if water resources are abundant, they are inadequate to satisfy all demand. Although Algeria as the biggest country in Africa, it used to have the most important freshwater reservoirs. In recent years, the water scarcity has become an important problem to address. Seawater desalination is one of the solutions to approach the lack of potable water. This allows drinking water to be produced using different techniques and technologies. The objective of this work is to study the operating performance of the seawater desalination plant of Chatt El Hilal at Ain Temouchent Province, using reverse osmosis, through a series of measurements carried out on physio-chemical process parameters by monitoring the quality of the desalinated water. Several water samples were collected at different desalination stages. This involved seawater, brine and treated water. The experiment was conducted over various times in the year 2019 to evaluate the variation of the parameters during different seasons. In addition, this research covers energy consumption cost analysis and highlights the most important side of the seawater desalination, the environmental impacts of the plant on the local aquatic environment concluding with the result of the analysis and recommendations to enhance the quality and productivity.