Potential Desalination Application In China:an Economic Analysis

As China has developed over the years, its rapid economic growth and expansion has had grave consequences on its environment. With the pollution of more then half of its rivers that feed water into their cities, Water pollution is becoming a big problem for the Chinese. On top of that, because water is spread so sporadically around China, water shortages are affecting millions of Chinese daily, especially those in the north.In the Middle East, and countries that have a shortage in their water resource, Desalination has become somewhat of a godsend. Providing potable drinking water to its people, who would not get enough water to drink to survive without the desalination technologies.The main objective of this Thesis is to see if it is economically practical and feasible for desalination to work in china, while also providing suggestions on possible changes that China could make economically to help fight the shortage of water within the country.As a result from this study, we have found that the costs of desalinating water has cost drastically over the years, Desalinating brackish water is dropped to.6 US dollars per cubic meter, while desalting seawater averages as about 1 US dollar per cubic meter. We also found that the cost to pump water vertically cost dramatically more then transporting it horizontally; transporting water 100 meters vertically cost as much as transporting 100 kilometers horizontally.We can conclude that countries where energy prices are low, and situated near a coast would benefit more from a desalination plant then one that is situated inland, and where energy costs are high. While desalination is still expensive for the Chinese, as time passes, and the prices drop, it will be coming an ideal option to help deal with China’s water crisis.