ACCIONA along with its Consortium Partner Sepco 3 and in close cooperation with Al Jubail International Water Company and the Saudi Water Partnership Company (SWPC), has already started up the desalination plant Jubail 3B energizing the facility by switching on the power transformers and its downstream switchgears.

The next step will be to start operating the solo pumps, heading the seawater availability to move forward with the wet commissioning.

Once all the required parameters are met in each stage of filtration, the process will move on until the plant produces potable water, expected in the coming months, with the goal of having the plant fully operational by 2024.

The utility, equipped with reverse osmosis technology, will have a daily capacity of 570,000 cubic meter per day to supply 2 million people in the cities of Riyadh and Qassim once commercially operational in 2024.

“This is a major milestone achieved and proves that the cooperation spirit and joined efforts extended by all the stakeholders, are allowing us to complete all phases on time, for the plant to be fully operational by 2024”, said Adelaida Fernandez Díaz, Project Director of Jubail 3B.

Javier Nieto, Country Director of Saudi Arabia on the ACCIONA’s Water business, highlights the Jubail 3 B Project as a benchmark of desalination plants using renewal energy: “This plant will contribute to Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 and net-zero objectives, which seek to reduce the country’s reliance on fossil fuels and drive the shift to clean energy”.

REDUCING THE EMISSIONS

In addition to the entire reverse osmosis (RO) desalination plant, ACCIONA will build a 61 MWp solar photovoltaic installation next to it. This is the largest in-house solar capability for a desalination plant in KSA, which will reduce the power consumption from the grid. For this purpose, 70% of all available land will be covered with photovoltaic panels that will substantially reduce the CO2 emissions.

Besides, the plant is equipped with Reverse Osmosis technology, which is not only the most economical solution, but also the most sustainable one: desalinating 1,000 litres of water uses the same amount of energy as an air conditioning system in a house for one hour.