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The consortium of Spain-based infrastructure company Acciona and Chinese contractor Sepco III has started the construction of the 570,000 cubic metres per day (m3/day) Jubail 3B Independent Water Project (IWP) in Saudi Arabia.
Acciona said in a press statement consortium will undertake the Engineering, Procurement and Construction of the entire Reverse Osmosis (RO) desalination plant along with a 61 Megawatt-peak (MWp) capacity photovoltaic solar facility, which is the largest in-house solar capability for a desalination plant in the Kingdom, to reduce the power consumption from the grid.
Jubail 3B project is being developed and financed by a consortium consisting of Engie, Nesma and Ajlan for Saudi Water Partnership Company (SWPC).
The statement said the project will also include the storage tanks for daily production, the Electrical Special Facilities - Electrical Substation and 59-km of an Overhead Transmission Line (OHTL) and the associated marine works.
Once operational in 2024, Jubail 3B will supply two million people in the cities of Riyadh and Qassim with drinking water. The project will also increase Acciona’s RO-based desalination portfolio in Saudi Arabia to be around 2.36 billion of m3/day.
Adelaida Fernandez Díaz, Project Director of Jubail 3B, said: “This plant will help to the contribution of 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.”
(Writing by SA Kader; Editing by Anoop Menon)
