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AWWA MTC93046
- Summary and Comparison of Sea Water Desalting Projects in California
- Conference Proceeding by American Water Works Association, 01/01/1993
- Publisher: AWWA
$12.00$24.00
This paper in a series of case studies summarizes several of California's more interesting seawater desalting projects in some detail, including: Marin Municipal Water District, Monterey Peninsula Water Management District, City of Santa Barbara, City of Ventura, and San Diego County Water Authority. Each of these five projects is interesting for one or more reasons. For example, the Marin project included the only seawater desalting pilot plant operated on San Francisco Bay. Several other studies are discussed in lesser detail. Based on the studies to date, sea water desalting costs range from about $1,600 to $2,000 per acre foot delivered to customers. This figure includes repayment of capital costs at 8% interest over 20 years. Reverse osmosis in almost every case has been shown to be less expensive than distillation processes including mechanical vapor compression, even in instances where siting the desalting plant at a power plant was possible.