Thermal Desalination Units Contracted for China’s Tianjin Power Plant

IDE Technologies (Israel) announce that it has signed a second contract with Tianjin SDIC, China’s new mega-electricity generation plant, for the deployment of four additional Multi-Effect Distillation (MED) desalination units, each with a production capacity of 25,000 m3/day of distillated water, for a total additional capacity of 100,000 m3/day. The four additional MED units will double the plant’s current water desalination capacity currently provided by four IDE MED units previously deployed and will result in a total daily capacity of 200,000 m3/day, making it China’s largest desalination plant.

“IDE’s MED technology will enable us to realize an environmentally friendly power-seawater-desalination-salt production model, helping us to minimize our environmental footprint while reducing our costs,” commented Mr. Guo Qigangang, General Manager of the Tianjin SDIC Electric Power Plant. “We are proud to be implementing this world-class design and believe it will serve as a model for other power plants throughout the world.”

Located near Beijing, the Tianjin SDIC power plant is being built to generate 4,000 MW of electricity to meet the growing needs of Tianjin city and alleviate electricity shortages in northern China. The IDE units will provide the desalinated seawater required for use in the power plant’s steam boilers, as well as drinking water for local residents. The ability of the MED units to re-use waste heat generated by the power plant reduces total desalination costs, while also minimizing the plant’s discharge of heat into the atmosphere.

“We are proud to have been selected once again by one of the world’s most advanced power plants to provide a state-of-the-art desalination solution,” said Avshalom Felber, IDE’s CEO. “This ambitious project strengthens our position in the strategic China market and in the Asia Pacific (APAC) region as a whole, which has been a focus of our activities for more than two decades. We believe that our industry-leading solutions and know-how, together with our record on mega-projects such as the SDIC Tianjin project, will help us expand our business significantly in China, India and other areas of the water-challenged APAC region. This follow-on order from a major Chinese customer to create the largest desalination plant in China confirms our leadership position in the Chinese and APAC markets."