Quang Ngai (VNA) – Doosan Heavy Industries Vietnam Co.’s (Doosan Vina) first batchof seawater desalination equipment left Dung Quat port for Saudi Arabia on July19.

This is part of the 430 million USD Shoaiba-4 Seawater Reserve Osmosis (SWRO)desalination project, inked between Doosan Vina and Saudi Arabia’s Saline WaterConversion Co. (SWCC). Under the deal, Doosan Vina and Doosan’s subsidiarieswill produce some 1,727 tonnes of desalination equipment for the project.

The firstbatch with 566 tonnes of equipment is expected to dock at Saudi Arabia in thenext three weeks. The following three shipments are scheduled for August,September, and December.

The Shoaiba-4 project will meet the potable water requirements of SaudiArabia’s second largest city, Jaddah, with a population of 5 million people. Oncethe Shoaiba-4 water plant becomes operational, it will produce 400,000 cubicmetres of fresh water per day, or 146 billion litres of drinking water peryear, which is equivalent to 58,400 Olympic swimming pools.

The four phases of the desalination facility will have a combined capacity ofover 400 trillion litres of water per year.

Shoaiba-4 is the first of many major WWRO desalination projects to be built inSaudi Arabia following the reorganisation of the country’s water sector in2016.-VNA