Spain: Befesa wins RO pilot plant in Tarragona

Spanish company Befesa Agua has won a construction contract for a reverse-osmosis (RO) pilot desalination plant to be built next to the L'Ampolla water treatment plant in Tarragona, Spain.

Consorcio de Aguas de Tarragona awarded the contract to correct mineralisation problems in the plant's output.

Peak values and duration times of episodes of high mineral content, particularly sulphates and chlorides, combined with inorganic subproducts of current treatment have been worsening recently, endangering compliance with legislation. The RO plant is intended to allow data collection, which could lead to design of a future 150,000 m³/d industrial facility.

The pilot plant will treat 11.5 m³/h of the treatment-plant output water and will eliminate 90-95% of its dissolved salts. The demineralised water flow will be 95% of the pilot plant input flow: the rejection will only be 5%.

The future industrial facility will treat only half of the treatment plant's effluent, which will be mixed with the rest of the non-demineralised drinking water. The resulting flow for distribution will be within legal parameters.