Development status of global seawater desalination industry and dynamically comparative analysis of its production cost

Abstract

This paper summarizes seawater desalination’s development status in China and abroad, then analyses its domestic development trend and attention through Baidu Index. Then compares the cost differences among RO, MED and other technologies in different scales and years and their change trend. Furthermore, the paper identifies the main impacting factors of production costs with RO and MED and evaluates their contributions to the cost through actual cases. The results show that: with the expansion of production scale and technological progress, the production cost of seawater desalination is gradually reduced, and the cost of RO and MED was reduced by 29.75% and 36.97% from 1999 to 2017, respectively. In the production cost of seawater desalination, power cost accounts for nearly 40%, and fixed asset investment accounts for about 20%. On a 100000 m3/d scale, the production costs with RO or MED in China are 26.85% and 22.50% higher than those of foreign countries, respectively. The production cost of seawater desalination is about 1.28 times of tap water and 1.20 times of reclaimed water in China. In the future, reducing the production cost of seawater desalination in China can be promoted through scientific investment and operation, technological progress and innovation, improving the cost structure, making up for the shortage of talents, and government guidance and support mutually.