The Center for Seawater Desalination Plant of GIST exports desalination technology to Chile

 

- Doosan Heavy Industries wins $103 million contract to construct desalination plant in Chile … the largest scale in Latin America

- Produces 220,000 tons of fresh water a day… “Result of our own desalination technologies”

 

 

 

The Center for Seawater Desalination Plant of GIST(Director Kim, In S./ Professor of School of Environmental Science and Engineering) of GIST(Gwangju Institute of Science Technology, President  Young Joon Kim), which is a key strategic R&D project of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, will export its technologies to Chile.

 

The Center for Seawater Desalination Plant said that Doosan Heavy Industries which is participating in the same project with the Center as a core research institute has recently won a 103 million dollar contract (approx. 114.7 billion won) from Chile to construct a reverse osmosis sea water desalination plant where technologies developed by the Center will be adopted.

 

This plant will be constructed in Antofagasta, northern Chile and produce 220,000 tons of fresh water a day starting 2016, which amount is equivalent to water consumption by 550,000 people a day. The size of the contract is the largest among similar reverse osmosis projects awarded in Latin America thus far.

 

The Seawater Desalination Plant project is a large-scale R&D project where the Korean government allocates 95.5 billion won out of its annual R&D budget. It was launched in 2006 as one of 10 projects developed by Korea Agency for Infrastructure Technology Advancement for the purpose of creating prospective future growth engines for the nation. This project also involves domestic companies such as Doosan Heavy Industries, Woongjin Chemical and Hyosung Goodsprings. The Center for Seawater Desalination Plant has strived to develop unique sea water desalination technologies of its own, including the world’s largest single train engineering technology, and this contract awarded from Chile is one of the outcomes of its efforts as such.

 

The research outcomes and influence of the Center was recognized in the Top Academics and Institutions in Water Research 2013 by Lux Research announced in May, thanks to which GIST ranked 7^th among water research institutes around the world.