White Paper: Recycling And Reuse Of Desalinated Seawater

Desalination of seawater provides high quality water that is used for both municipal and industrial purposes. In most cases the desalinated water is used once and then after being treated as wastewater is discharged back to the sea. In contrast, fresh water in large inland river systems is recycled and reused. This occurs when downstream users pump water that contains discharge from a wastewater treatment plant. Modern membrane technology allows desalinated water to be used more than once by purifying wastewater treatment discharge. It is not considered politically or socially acceptable to recycle this water for potable use, but the water quality is more than adequate for industrial use.

This paper presents the technology that is capable of treating wastewater, discusses how this technology is suitable for the challenges presented by wastewater treatment, presents examples of what can be expected as water quality, and presents the results of a plant handling wastewater.