Penate-Suarez, Baltasar , de la Fuente-Bencomo, Juan Antonio , Melian-Monroy, Gustavo , Urrea, Sigrid Y. Arenas , GONZALEZ ALMENARA, RAFAEL, Garcia-Rodriguez, Lourdes
No
Energy Conv. Manag.-X
Article
Científica
1
1
01/05/2026
001712920900001
This paper presents the most energy efficient 2,500 m(3)/d desalination plant using seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) technology, referred to as DESALRO 2.0 (R), which has achieved the Guinness World Record (GWR) with an Specific Energy Consumption (SEC) of 1.794 kWh/m(3) (February 2025) with 40% of recovery rate and an appropriate product water quality (TDS < 200 mg/L, B < 1 mg/L). It is located at ITC - DESAL+ LIVING LAB facilities in Pozo Izquierdo (- Canary Islands, Spain) - 37 g/L, 22 degrees C, B < 1 mg/L -. The Canary Islands Institute of Technology (ITC) developed the design of the plant whereas the temporary joint venture Canaragua-Elmasa carried out the plant construction. The design has been scaled up to 5,000 m3/d. DESALRO 2.0 (R) plant is based on an advanced SWRO rack implemented with commercial products. The system consists in feed water pressurisation by means of positive displacement high-pressure pumps (HPP) working in parallel, along with two isobaric chambers as energy recovery device (ERD) and a booster pump. Besides, an optimised design of the RO membranes inside the pressure vessels includes different models of membrane elements (hybrid internal design). Finally, the hydraulic design of the plant minimises the pressure losses.
Seawater desalination; Reverse osmosis; Energy efficiency; Optimised SWRO rack