• Project: Cartagena Phase I SWRO
• Entity: Ministry of the Environment.
• Location: San Pedro del Pinatar, Murcia. Spain.
• Capacity: 65,000 m³/day.

Objetive:

To desalinate sea water to supply water to the Associations of the Canales del Taibilla through a concession for a period of 15 years.

Description:

The catchment of sea water is carried out through the technique called directed horizontal catchment. For this, 20 drains with 350 mm diameter have been perforated in the seabed of the beaches of Higueretas and Pilar de la Horadada (Alicante). The aim is to avoid any impact on the quality of subterranean water to minimise the environmental impact. It is the first desalination plant in the world to use this catchment system.

• Disinfection through the addition of sulphuric acid, sodium hypochlorite and ferric chloride.
• Pumping of raw water through 4 sea water pumps with a flow of 1,200 m³/h.
• Sand filtration through 12 metal filters.
• The safety filtration system has 10 cartridge filters. Each one of these has 240 winding cartridges of 5 microns.
• The bisulphate is dosed for the elimination of residual chlorine and other oxidants present in the water.
• High pressure pumping and energy recovery using 10 turbo-pump groups (9+1 reserve) composed of a pump, motor and Pelton turbine.
• 9 frames with 180 pressure tubes per frame and 7 membranes per pressure tube.
• 45% conversion.
• Remineralisation through lime and CO².