RIYADH: Saudi Arabia is leading the way with sustainable, energy-efficient desalination projects while maintaining its position as a world leader in desalinated water production.

The Middle East and North African region have some of the lowest water availability levels per capita among the world’s most water-scarce regions.

This makes the region heavily dependent on desalination, even though desalination directly impacts the issue of sustainability and renewable energy.

Developers in the Kingdom, however, aim to maintain their plants and operations in line with the country’s Vision 2030 goals and its leadership position in desalinated water production.

Saudi energy firm ACWA Power is moving away from thermal-powered systems and switching entirely to reverse osmosis plants to facilitate efficient power consumption, said Tariq Nada, the company’s vice president for water and technical services.

ACWA Power is the world’s largest private operator of water desalination plants, with a production capacity of 6.4 million cubic meters of desalinated water a day.

The company has a robust portfolio of 10 seawater reverse osmosis projects in the Kingdom and the Gulf Cooperation Council, in which some projects are partially powered by renewable energy.

The desalination industry has also strengthened with the advent of international companies in the Kingdom. Spain’s Acciona, a leader in renewable energy and infrastructure, is one example. The company has delivered two plants in the Kingdom.

It is currently building four more, producing more than 2.36 billion liters of drinking water daily, providing water for more than 8 million people in the country, which is about a quarter of the population.

Julio de la Rosa, Acciona’s business development director for water solutions in the Middle East, told Arab News that the company reduced the emissions associated with desalination by integrating solar energy at the plants and optimizing brine reuse. 

Acciona reduced the emissions associated with desalination by integrating solar energy at the plants and optimizing brine reuse.

Julio de la Rosa, Acciona’s business development director for water solutions in the Middle East

The execution of these projects is in alignment with the UN Sustainable Development Goals and the company’s vision of designing a better planet, Rosa said.

Each project designed and implemented by Acciona promotes sustainable development from all three perspectives: Environmental, economic and social.

Rosa said their technology enables them to deliver on their promise and mission to build sustainable water treatment in the Kingdom.

In the last few years, Acciona has developed several projects such as Tabuk 2, Buraydah 2, Madinah 3, independent water project Shuqaiq 3, SWRO Alkhobar phases 1 and 2 and Jubail 3B.

The Jubail 3B desalination plant will filter 570,000 cubic meters per day, enough to supply 2 million people in Riyadh and Qassim once it begins operation in 2024.

The plant will draw some of its power from a dedicated 61 megawatts photovoltaic facility, which Acciona will also build.

This facility will be the largest in-house solar plant for a desalination plant in the Kingdom. It will reduce the emissions associated with desalination and relieve power demand from the national grid.

In addition, the project includes storage tanks, an electricity substation, an overhead transmission line spanning 59km and associated marine works.

RIYADH: Water desalination in Saudi Arabia has doubled over the past decade to reach 2.2 billion cubic meters in 2021, up from 1.1 billion cubic meters per year in 2010, thanks to a major overhaul of some existing plants and the introduction of new technologies.

For instance, Jubail 2, one of the Kingdom’s largest water desalination plants that serve Riyadh and Jubail, increased its annual production capacity by roughly 30 percent to 380 million cubic meters in 2021 from under 300 million cubic meters in 2014.

However, to meet the growing domestic demand for water, the desalination industry in the Kingdom is all poised to consider making another breakthrough. 

A brief history outlined below shows water desalination plays a vital role in the Kingdom’s economy.

The process of water desalination in the Kingdom dates back to the early 1900s, when Jeddah became the first city to install two privately-owned distillation condensers to meet the city’s rising demand. 

Yanbu and Jazan, the other coastal cities of the Kingdom, followed the same approach of developing their private seawater distillation condensers until the entire industry was nationalized and regulated under the Ministry of Environment, Water and Agriculture in 1965.

As the method started gaining popularity in the region, the Saline Water Conversion Corp. was founded as an independent government entity in 1974 to promote and regulate water distillation operations in the Kingdom.

Although it started as costly and inefficient, it was crucial for the Kingdom’s increasing population needs. 

Further, its geographic location puts it at a disadvantage in accessing different types of water resources like, for example, rainfall.

Therefore, its options were limited to shallow and deep groundwater and desalinated water. 

The rise in population to 33.5 million in 2018 from just 25.2 million in 2007 brought about a 70 percent increase in potable water demand, according to a research report published in the Journal of Water Process Engineering back in 2019.

The report added that it would be impossible for groundwater to last 50 years at this consumption rate, highlighting the option of water desalination, which has been strategically considered and implemented by the government. 

In 2010, SWCC produced some 1.1 billion cubic meters of water at its 30 desalination plants located on the east and west coasts of the Kingdom, which met approximately 50 percent of the domestic water demand in the Kingdom.

The company further improved its capacity to 5.2 million cubic meters per day of water or 1.9 billion cubic meters a year, in 2018. 

In 2021, SWCC produced 2.2 billion cubic meters of water and operated 32 production plants. As a byproduct of water distillation, it generated 47 million megawatts per hour of electricity. 

In major cities, the desalinated share in total water consumption is pretty high, especially in the cities like Makkah, Jeddah and Taif where almost all of their drinking water comes from nearby desalination plants.

The share for Riyadh and the Kingdom stood at 63-64 percent in 2020.

Thermal distillation and reverse osmosis are the two most popular methods used to convert seawater into potable water. 

The former uses heat to vaporize seawater, separating the salt from the water, and then the vaporized gas is cooled down into the water through condensation.

The latter passes seawater through a semipermeable membrane that separates salt from water, wasting less energy in the process. 

Moreover, SWCC has partaken in two renewable energy projects being developed in alignment with the Vision 2030 blueprint.

The future of water desalination in Saudi Arabia looks promising and challenging simultaneously. Therefore, SWCC aims to take on more renewable sources for its water desalination projects, to reduce the conversion cost, thereby improving conversion efficiency and cutting carbon emissions simultaneously. 

Assuming the current population growth rates hold through the next 10-15 years, the Kingdom may require a desalinated water capacity of up to 4.5 billion cubic meters per year in 2040, a profound research report released in 2014 suggested. In effect, the output will be required to double again from the 2021 production level.

No matter how efficient or productive methods of water desalination get, at this rate, Saudi Arabia will have to resort to methods of decreasing demand, whether it is through awareness campaigns or imposing taxes on high water usage.

CAIRO: Tabby, the UAE-based buy now, pay later fintech company, will soon be widening its scope in Saudi Arabia with the introduction of its virtual card in the Kingdom.

The Tabby virtual card is a Visa card that allows shoppers to split their purchases into four payments at select in-store locations.

Fresh off securing $150 million in debt financing in early August, the company wants to provide easy payment options in the Arab world’s largest economy, where less than 20 percent of the population has a credit card, said a senior company official.

“Saudi Arabia has a penetration rate of around 0.3 credit cards per person, so there is a real need for easy consumer credit, especially for day-to-day payments,” Abdulaziz Saja, general manager of Tabby Saudi Arabia, told Arab News exclusively. 

Tabby is aiming to empower in-store users using the virtual card in addition to a huge focus of the company’s operations going into providing payment solutions for all users, not just online.

Abdulaziz Saja, general manager of Tabby Saudi Arabia

Users can activate the card using the Tabby app, add it to their preferred digital wallets and tap the payment terminal at checkout to divide their payments into installments.

“After the successful launch of the Tabby Virtual Card in UAE, we want to bring it to Saudi Arabia,” said Saja.

He added that Tabby is aiming to empower in-store users using the virtual card in addition to a huge focus of the company’s operations going into providing payment solutions for all users, not just online.

The company will also use its recently raised funding to sustain its balance sheet as BNPL requires very high capital.

“Some of that funding will also invest in young Saudi talent. Because as we grow the company, we’ll also be looking into hiring locally for product managers and software engineers,” Saja added.

Tabby currently operates in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Egypt, with 85 percent of its sales volume happening in the Kingdom, Saja stated.

He attributed the company’s growth in the Kingdom primarily to the rise in the adoption of e-commerce during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“An additional factor is the effect of a 15 percent value-added tax that has also put a bit of stress on customer disposable incomes here,” he added.

Saja also said that the Saudi market has a huge population compared to the UAE, in addition to the booming last-mile delivery services in the Kingdom.

The Saudi Central Bank’s Sandbox program also nurtured the company, closely monitoring its challenges and performance.

“We’ve also given back to the community by mentoring young companies participating in the Saudi fintech accelerated program,” Saja said.

“Our main stakeholder in Saudi Arabia is the central bank, but we’ve also engaged with several other entities that have helped us either source talent or connect with investors,” he added.

Tabby has raised $275 million since its launch in the UAE in late 2019. Its latest $150 million round was from US-based venture capital firms Atalaya Capital Management and Partners for Growth.

Tabby currently has over 4,000 global brands and small businesses, with over 2 million active users on its platform.

The company also experienced 10 times growth in revenue, eight times in active users, and three times in active retailer partners in just the first half of 2022 compared to the same period last year.

LONDON: Britain’s largest energy supplier Centrica is planning to voluntarily cap profits in an effort to cut household bills, the Guardian newspaper reported on Saturday, citing Chief Executive Chris O’Shea.

O’Shea said he was keen for British Gas owner Centrica to become the first company to sign up to new, renegotiated contracts with the government on its electricity generation, the newspaper reported.

“We are prepared to offer our electricity production and our North Sea and Irish Sea gas production into this mechanism to help reduce energy bills for consumers and we hope others will follow,” O’Shea said.

He did not give further details, and the Guardian said he declined to say what proportion of Centrica’s profits he was prepared to relinquish.

Britain’s new Prime Minister Liz Truss has pledged to cap soaring consumer energy bills for two years, a move she said would protect consumers and businesses.

Opposition parties have said she should impose a windfall tax on energy generators, but she has rejected this idea, saying she would instead renegotiate some contracts with generators. She has not given precise details on how this would work.

“We are obviously in this business to create value for all of our stakeholders, customers, country colleagues. But it’s not about maximizing this year’s profits; it’s about having a long-term sustainable business,” O’Shea was quoted as saying.

Centrica posted a huge rise in first-half profit, boosted by asset sales and soaring energy prices. Its adjusted operating profit for the first six months of 2022 rose to 1.34 billion pounds ($1.55 billion), up from 262 million a year earlier.

RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Economy and Planning Faisal Al-Ibrahim on Friday stressed the Kingdom’s commitment to renewing global cooperation and achieving the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Speaking during the conclusion of the G20 development ministers’ meeting in Belitung, Indonesia, Al-Ibrahim said that the two-day forum was an opportunity to work together more closely and put forward concrete actions to support developing countries and foster inclusive, resilient, socially, economically and environmentally sustainable recovery efforts.

As the world’s fastest-growing economy, the Kingdom was proud to renew and reaffirm its commitment toward achieving these goals, he said.

Al-Ibrahim said that participants at the meeting stressed the need to activate joint and comprehensive action to implement the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development within the framework of the work achieved throughout Indonesia’s presidency of the G20.

“International cooperation is a key priority for the Kingdom, and we remain more committed than ever to work closely with our international partners to achieve the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs,” he said.

“To do this, we must restore faith in the multilateral framework, and we are fully aligned with the G20 ministerial vision statement’s claim that multilateralism is not an option but a necessity if we want to create a more equitable, resilient, and sustainable world.”

Saudi Arabia has already taken steps to accelerate its path toward achieving the UN 2030 Agenda and the SDGs. Rapid and decisive measures taken by the Kingdom’s government have enabled the country to limit the impact of COVID-19 on the economy.

In June, the Ministry of Economy and Planning and the UN resident coordinator’s office in Riyadh signed the UN Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework.

CAIRO: With 70 percent of the world’s desalination plants located in the Middle East, the sector needs innovation driven by entrepreneurial talent.

Nearly two-thirds of the region’s population live in areas lacking sufficient renewable water sources. Some countries in the Middle East rely on water desalination to produce up to 90 percent of drinking water.

Moreover, water desalination requires vast amounts of energy to complete the process, and the role of innovation is starting to increase in reducing the operational cost and environmental impact caused by water issues.

Abu Dhabi-based startup Manhat is already pitching in to decrease the environmental impact with its patented solar energy-based water desalination products.

• Abu Dhabi-based startup Manhat is already pitching in to decrease the environmental impact with its patented solar energy-based water desalination products.

• The company’s technology is based on placing sealed constructs on open water surfaces where water evaporates due to solar radiation.

The company’s technology is based on placing sealed constructs on open water surfaces where water evaporates due to solar radiation.

“Our technology mimics the natural water cycle with zero carbon footprint or brine rejection. The water can be immediately used to irrigate crops which will benefit coastal countries and mitigate the looming threat of rising sea levels due to climate change,” Saeed Alhassan, founder of Manhat, said in a statement.

Global desalination plants are expected to emit 218 million tons of carbon dioxide annually by 2040, which calls for the importance of government and private sector investments in solutions for the water industry.

In a report by the Clean Energy Business Council in the Middle East and North African region, several barriers arise for startups trying to enter the clean-tech industry.

The report indicates that governmental barriers play a huge role in shaping the ecosystem. Firstly, the region’s regulatory structure limits entrepreneurs’ ability to explore new opportunities in the sector.

In addition to complex administration and market barriers, the region needs a regulatory framework that will spur innovation and privatization of the sector.

Moreover, venture capital investments made into startups in the industry are also meager compared to other sectors like e-commerce and fintech.

The report calls out to venture capitalists to start recognizing the potential opportunities that regional startups might offer by building innovation hubs within universities.

Saudi Arabia is one of the countries in the region that has seen startups grow out of universities like water desalination company, QualSens.

QualSens was established at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology as it aims to monitor and enhance the water desalination process using its technology.

“We combined different approaches to building a smart sensor that detects and identifies the fouling developed in the system and helps the operator mitigate it. The objective is to decrease the energy demand required for the production of drinking water,” Luca Fortunato, Co-founder of QualSens, said in a statement.

Although startups are still far from impacting the water desalination sector in the Middle East, governments and large corporations are starting to recognize the importance of innovation for sustainable water production.

Paddy Padmanathan, the CEO of ACWA Power, one of the largest water desalination companies in the region, had said earlier that innovation and entrepreneurship would play a crucial role in addressing the looming water crisis.