Category Archives: Desalinization

Bringing Water Design Vision to the “Rest of the Mess” in Real Estate

Posted on by
1

Shanghai Towers

Shanghai Towers

The Shanghai Tower will serve as a mammoth 125-floor rainwater harvesting structure. The breathtaking outside shell borrows the best designs from nature, collecting rain to purify and replenish 675,000,000 liters of water each year. Combining stores, offices and apartments, the building will serve as an icon for water resource management in China, as the country struggles to find enough clean water for its people and its growing economy.

“Unfortunately, most of the buildings in the world are not Shanghai Towers – most of the buildings aren’t new,” noted Dave Pogue, Director of Sustainability for CB Richard Ellis in the Artemis Project webinar earlier today.

“While some of our buildings are new, we also need to be concerned about managing the ‘rest of the mess’,” David Pogue, CB Richard Ellis.

Shanghai Towers

Shanghai Towers

“While some of our buildings are new, we also need to be concerned about managing the ‘rest of the mess’,” Pogue explained.  CBRE manages over 1.2 billion square feet of property in the Americas, and the bulk of those buildings are not new. Environmental considerations must contend with budgets.  “We have a lot of buildings struggling trying to find a way to be better in a water constrained world,” Pogue stated.

While water is vital, it is virtually free today.  And water seldom gets attention until there is a crisis.  Pogue noted that basic water saving devices such as toilets and urinals generate only a trickle of benefits and take 8 to 10 years to pay back. They’re better than nothing, but still just a small drop in the bucket.

We’re still waiting for the onsite appliance that reclaims water and treats rainwater with the precision and beauty of a miniature Shanghai Tower.  Small-scale onsite waste water systems operate today, recycling water from sinks and toilets to save over half of the drinking water used by an apartment building.  Companies like Dominic Sulik’s Natural Solutions Utilities are offering whole building solutions for onsite water management that match much of the savings from the Shanghai Tower. This offering is a service that pieces together existing solutions.

Property Chart

Property Chart

We can see the crises are coming, but we are still waiting for the Apple version of a building water system that matches the benefits of the Shanghai Tower.

“Its not about the cost of water, it’s about the downtime and the risk for the property,” John Macomber, Harvard Business School.

“Its not about the cost of water, it’s about the downtime and the risk for the property,” notes John Macomber, Professor of Sustainability at Harvard Business School.  If there is a lower cost of capital for a better risk-adjusted return on the property, then onsite water management makes sense financially.

Sustainable Building Image

Sustainable Building Image

Professor Macomber suggests that real estate properties such as accommodations and hospitality operations—hotels, spas, and hospitals—are examples of some of the early candidates for water tech. “The beach head for water tech is where the landlord pays for the water, where the landlord can effectively measure the benefit of an intervention, and where the volume of water used really matters to the economics.”

Desalitech Reduces Costs of Desalination

Posted on by
10
Middelgrunden Windmills Outside Copenhagen

Efficient desalination can utilize alternative energy, like these Danish windmills, thus relying on the ocean twice. / Photo: andjohan on Flickr

The most common question I field when I mention desalination is, “Doesn’t that take a lot of energy?”

The truth is, yes, it does. That’s why you’ll not hear me advocate for desalination without strongly insisting on complementary conservation.

We must redouble our conservation efforts by upgrading infrastructure intelligently and in no way excuse wasteful water practices by pointing to the plentiful, historical ingredients of desalination: oceans of water and oceans of coal.

Each barrel of freshwater extracted from the ocean has costs, so we should use the water as efficiently as possible, recycling it and then remediating it into the water cycle.

Yet, conservation alone isn’t going to meet our water needs. The world’s population is expected to increase by 2.5 billion over the next 30 – 40 years, while the current, natural water cycle is not expected to increase its output.

Just as we must increase conservation, we must prepare for the impending water plateau by increasing our capacity to produce fresh water.

Hence my excitement in June when I heard about Desalitech’s successful pilot.

The test purified Mediterranean saltwater, using Desalitech’s proprietary Closed-Circuit Desalination saltwater reverse osmosis method (SWRO-CCD).

Using common components, without energy recovery, running a high-pressure pump at 81% mean efficiency and circulation pump at 37.5% mean efficiency, the pilot achieved 48% recovery at 2.05 – 2.40 kWh per cubic meter of fresh water. For comparison, Perth’s desalination plant using Energy Recovery from ERI achieves 43% recovery at 2.32 kWh/m3.

Desalitech aims to increase the mean efficiency of the off-the-shelf, high-pressure pump to 88%, to provide recovery at 1.75 – 1.95 kWh/m3 on Mediterranean saltwater. The same pumps used on ocean water could produce equal recovery at 1.5 – 1.7 kWh/m3.

Desalitech’s implementation reduces the cost of powering desalination processes. It also decreases capital expenditures. Nadav Efraty, CEO of Desalitech, told me, “This technology is reducing energy consumption by up to 50% when we utilize about twice the membranes, reduces energy by about 10-15% when we use only 40% of the membranes compared to a conventional plant, or reduces energy about 30% when we utilizes the same amount of membranes, but in this mode, since we don’t utilize any form of energy recovery, we still see a reduction in capital expenditures.”

Even with less than half the membranes, the technology still sees 10-15% energy reduction. That’s a 60% savings on capital expenditures for membranes.

As an added element of efficiency, plants utilizing Desalitech’s technology can turn plants up and down depending on demand: Nadav explained, “The very same unit can operate at very high production rates part of the day (when power rates are low for example) and in extremely low energy consumption the rest of the day.”

Desalitech does this by independently controlling component flow rates, recovery, pressures and cross flow irrespective of the other variables.

Following their successful pilot, Desalitech is addressing brackish water. Desalitech’s three BWRO installations are fully operational facilities, capable of producing 10,000 m3 fresh water per day.

Market Driven Tree Hugging

Posted on by
4
A helicopter pours water on Californian wildfires in 2009 / Photo: kevindean on flickr

A number of small buckets of water can contain a wildfire / Photo: kevindean on flickr

Climate legislation in the United States just went up in a cloud of CO2. Again.

Which doesn’t for one second mean the battle is lost.

Regulation may have failed, but thankfully, the free-market surrounding water isn’t waiting for regulations to change. The BlueTech sector is already in position with profitable solutions to mitigate climate change.

The inefficient transportation and treatment of water from source to end-user accounts for 13% of energy use in the United States (and 17% in water-starved California).

As we reported earlier this year, the Carbon Footprint of Water Report calculated that a 5% decrease in infrastructure leaks in the United States would save 270 million gallons of water a day and 313 million kilowatt hours of electricity annually — enough to power 31,000 homes. Not only that, but it’d keep 225,000 metric tons of C02 emissions out of the air.

Meanwhile, cities like Pittsburgh, St. Louis and Seattle are introducing plans to replace aging infrastructure, to the tune of nearly $5 billion. Which is only a portion of the estimated $335 billion national pricetag.

It’s a perfectly timed confluence of events: we’re facing a global crisis. The inefficient water complex – which bears some responsibility for the crisis – is due for an upgrade. Simultaneously, innovation in water efficiency has bloomed.

Throughout the country the BlueTech industry is poised to offer municipalities and water authorities cost-savings and reduced costs to upgrade infrastructure via smart-water systems, efficient water-treatment and stormwater management, and positive revenue streams through resources recovered from waste streams.

As water supply ceases to match demand, new desalination technologies can replace ancient systems to achieve excellent energy efficiencies – often with decreased capital expenditures.

Each of these methods mitigates the causes of climate change by making efficient use of water, thereby making efficient use of energy. Efficient energy use reduces fossil fuel extraction (thereby reducing water usage still further) and reduces the release of pollutants like CO2 and mercury into the atmosphere and water supply.

And each of these methods reduces costs for implementers, either by reducing capital expenditures or by reducing operational costs. They’re a win for the economy and a win for the environment.

To be sure, it’d be helpful if Congress would expedite adoption of clean technology by establishing a firm price signal for pollution. But as American politicians have repeatedly refused, the free market is ready to manage the growing climate and water crises, with or without Congress.

Calera Captures Carbon in Concrete, Produces Clean Water

Posted on by
9
Concrete apartments in Gimhae, Republic of Korea, extend to the horizon.

In Gimhae, South Korea, concrete apartments extend to the horizon. / Photo: oceandestoiles on flickr

Concrete. There’s a lot of it on earth. Pretty much every paradise has its parking lot. And its big-box store, high-rise condos, sidewalks, stadiums and office parks. Bridges, tunnels, jetties, locks, canals, station platforms: all require concrete.

Concrete is the second most consumed substance on earth (pdf), after water: three tons of it per year, per person on earth.

Manufacturing all that concrete is the second largest source of carbon emissions in the world, after energy generation, accounting for 5% of world CO2 emissions.

But a Californian company, Calera, has developed a solution.

Calera’s process, called Mineralization via Aqueous Precipitation, makes producing cement – the binding ingredient in concrete – remarkably efficient, by tackling multiple problems in one play.

Continue reading →

Desalination Spending to Double

Posted on by
1
Azzizia Desalination Plant, Saudi Arabia

Azzizia Desalination Plant in Saudi Arabia / Photo: Waleed Alzuhair on Flickr

Here’s some good news for advanced desalination technology companies.

Worldwide desalting capacity is projected to increase by 50 million cubic meters per day over the next six years, according to a recent study by Pike Research.

Meanwhile, annual spending on desalination will double by 2016, from $8.3b to $16.6 billion. Spending will total $87.8 billion during that time period.

Continue reading →

Water Prices to Increase by 8% in WA

Posted on by
1
Drought in Western Australia

Cracked earth in Midland, Western Australia just east of Perth

Between 1997 and 2007 water supplies in Perth, the capital and largest city in Western Australia, decreased by 65%, leading Perth to commission the Kwinana desalinization plant in late 2006. The plant provides 130 million litres of water a day, and runs on renewable energy supplied by the Emu Downs Wind Farm.

Public pressure compelled the Western Australia Water Corp to utilize renewable energy. Pressure exchangers from Energy Recovery, Inc, an Artemis Top 50 company, save the plant 15.6 MW of energy, reducing energy usage at the plant to 180GWh a year. That’s only 66% of Emu Downs’ 270GWh a year produced from wind.

But the price of water throughout Western Australia continues to climb. The estimated 8% increase in Western Australia, announced today by Opposition Leader Eric Ripper, would complete a 40% increase in the cost of water to households in the past three years.

With their vast coastlines and open spaces, Western Australia can look to the seas for further partnerships between advanced, efficient water technology and sustainable energy like wind and solar.

Leaders in Western Australia seem to be thinking likewise. As Gary Crisp of Western Australia Water Corp said, “I predict that desalination will account for at least half of Perth’s water in the next 30 years.”

Photo credit: Aleatoric Consonance on Flickr