Control system for desalination plant in Saudi

Yokogawa has received an order from Petroleum, Chemicals & Mining Company (PCMC - a major EPC company in Saudi Arabia involved in the construction, engineering, and operation of plants in the oil, petrochemical, and gas industries) to supply the control system for the SWRO-4 Desalination Plant, which is being built in Jubail, Saudi Arabia by the Power & Water Utility Company for Jubail and Yanbu (Marafiq).

Jubail, located in the northern part of the Arabian Gulf, is one of the two major industrial cities in Saudi Arabia (the other is Yanbu on the Red Sea), and Marafiq provides electricity and water to both cities. The plant under construction, SWRO-4, will utilize reverse osmosis (RO) membranes to desalinate seawater, and will be able to produce 100,000 cubic meters of potable water per day. This is greater than the combined output of 77,000 cubic meters per day from the five desalination plants that Marafiq currently owns and operates in Jubail. Plants of this type rely on a technology that involves the application of pressure to seawater, thereby pushing it through a special membrane. Desalination occurs as the salt cannot pass through the membrane. The desalinated water from the new plant will be provided to the Jubail area.

Yokogawa is to deliver the CENTUM® VP integrated production control system and the Plant Resource Manager (PRM®) integrated device management package, the latter of which will be used for the monitoring and online diagnosis of the instrumentation devices in this plant. In addition, Yokogawa will deliver an operator training system to improve operator performance. Yokogawa Middle East & Africa is responsible for the entire project, including the engineering and commissioning of these products. Delivery is scheduled for 2014 and the plant will start operation at the end of September 2014.

In the Middle East, there is a serious water shortage due to rapid industrialization and population growth, especially in urban areas. To alleviate this problem, there are plans to construct many desalination plants. Desalination plants that use RO membranes are more efficient than those that rely on the evaporation of seawater, and so there is considerable demand for the construction of such plants throughout this region, as well as in other regions such as North America and Asia. Yokogawa aims to leverage this order to expand its control business with desalination plants and other segments of the water infrastructure market.