TY - JOUR
T1 - Cost-Benefit Analysis of Desalination
T2 - A Power Market Opportunity
AU - Mohammadi, Farshad
AU - Sahraei-Ardakani, Mostafa
AU - Al-Abdullah, Yousef
AU - Heydt, Gerald Thomas
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was partially supported by the Kuwait Foundation for Advancement of Sciences under Grant # PR18-15EC-01. Support from the General Secretariat of the Supreme Council of Planning and Development of Kuwait is also appreciated.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
PY - 2020
Y1 - 2020
N2 - Water desalination can offer a potential solution for water scarcity. Additionally, desalination technologies that mainly consume electric energy, such as reverse osmosis, can expand the market for electric utilities. Despite such benefits, the main question around desalination remains to be its economic competitiveness. To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of water desalination, this paper calculates two well-known engineering economic metrics: net present value (NPV) and levelized cost of water (LCOW), as applied to large-scale water desalination loads. The paper offers insights on the economic competitiveness of water desalination, compared to its alternatives, i.e., fresh surface and groundwater. The use of NPV is viewed as a planning tool, and LCOW is viewed as an operations tool, which has some significance in project planning. The paper discusses the nexus between operations and planning and offers some contemporary insight into the deployment of desalination worldwide. Additionally, the paper offers analysis on the economic benefits of integrating water desalination load in power systems, both from the point of view of desalination plant owners and electric utilities.
AB - Water desalination can offer a potential solution for water scarcity. Additionally, desalination technologies that mainly consume electric energy, such as reverse osmosis, can expand the market for electric utilities. Despite such benefits, the main question around desalination remains to be its economic competitiveness. To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of water desalination, this paper calculates two well-known engineering economic metrics: net present value (NPV) and levelized cost of water (LCOW), as applied to large-scale water desalination loads. The paper offers insights on the economic competitiveness of water desalination, compared to its alternatives, i.e., fresh surface and groundwater. The use of NPV is viewed as a planning tool, and LCOW is viewed as an operations tool, which has some significance in project planning. The paper discusses the nexus between operations and planning and offers some contemporary insight into the deployment of desalination worldwide. Additionally, the paper offers analysis on the economic benefits of integrating water desalination load in power systems, both from the point of view of desalination plant owners and electric utilities.
KW - economic analysis, electric energy market, flexible load, levelized cost of water (LCOW), net present value (NPV), power system planning, power system operation, reverse osmosis, water desalination, water scarcity
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U2 - 10.1080/15325008.2020.1829188
DO - 10.1080/15325008.2020.1829188
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85096096147
VL - 48
SP - 1091
EP - 1101
JO - Electric Power Components and Systems
JF - Electric Power Components and Systems
SN - 1532-5008
IS - 11
ER -