SINGAPORE OPENS NEW DESALINATION PLANT
Channel: A Singaporean
Date: 2021-02-05

SINGAPORE OPENS NEW DESALINATION PLANT

The Desalination Plant

Singapore officially opened the Keppel Marina East Desalination Plant on 4 February 2021, making it the fourth desalination plant here.

The desalination plant is the first large-scale desalination plant in Singapore that is able to treat both seawater and freshwater to produce drinking water. It is located between East Coast Park and Bay East Garden, giving it access to seawater from the East Coast and fresh water from the Marina Reservoir. It is not usually feasible for desalination plants to have dual functions, as many are located at sites with no freshwater available, like Tuas.

Desalination is viewed by the Public Utilities Board (PUB) as the most reliable out of the four national taps, the others being imported water, rainfall and recycled water. This is due to the fact that the sea offers a practically unlimited amount of seawater available for desalination.

The desalination plant is also more energy efficient, making the notoriously energy-intensive desalination process less polluting.

Why is this Important?

Singapore consumes 430 million gallons of water a day, and the amount used is expected to double by 2060. Furthermore, as the local catchments and water imported from Malaysia are already insufficient to meet our daily needs, this issue necessitates our water supply to be supplemented with NEWater (recycled used water) and desalination.

Another pressing reason is that of climate change. Singapore will experience more intense rainfall and more severe drought, which will result in major ponding and water scarcity more often. Hence, the new desalination plant will be useful here as water can be reliably obtained from the sea during dry spells, while water can be drawn from reservoirs during heavy rain. The benefit of being able to process freshwater during heavy rain is that not only does it prevent ponding as excess water is removed from the reservoirs, but also because the excess water will not have to be dumped into the sea and can instead be used, thus it won't be wasted.

Singapore currently relies on the Linggiu Reservoir in Malaysia (created when Singapore constructed the Linggiu Dam) for water extraction, to supply a large proportion of our freshwater for treatment. This is immensely risky as the reservoir fell to 20% of its capacity in 2016. Close shaves like this will only grow more common as weather conditions continue to grow more erratic over the years. Furthermore, Malaysian politics tends to be equally volatile, making it not impossible that Malaysia may one day renegade on the water agreement.

Hence, it is absolutely imperative that we improve our water security through the establishment of more water treatment plants.

Future Projects

Our fifth desalination plant will be located on Jurong Island and shall be completed in the first half of 2021. The project's deadline had to be pushed back from 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic hampering construction efforts.

The PUB also managed to regain control of the Tuas South Desalination Plant in 2019 from the water treatment firm Hyflux. The Tuas South Desalination Plant had to be returned to the PUB as it was seriously mismanaged by Hyflux, with Hyflux failing to properly maintain the plant and supply sufficient drinking water to Singaporeans as per the terms of the contract, compromising Singapore's water security. The plant is still able to remain operational during repairs. The repairs will cost around $80 million and shall be completed by mid-2021.