Performance and development of PV - plant for water pumping and desalination for remote area in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

PV plant for water pumping and desalination in remote area has been implemented; the plant was the first of its kind in Saudi Arabia. The design of PV plant was based on the specification of the site, the depth and quality of water, the daily water quantity produced and the autonomy period of the plant during cloudy conditions as well as other local climatic conditions. The plant has two main PV separate systems, first, PV water pumping system which is characterized by storing the water in two storage tanks and without electric energy storage, second, PV system for the operation of the reverse osmosis unit (water desalination), this system is characterized by the storage of electric energy (batteries). The storage batteries are used to supply the required electric power to the equipment in the plant, during night and cloudy weather. The batteries capacity is designed to be sufficient for 5 days autonomy. In order to make the operation and maintenance of the PV plant highly reliable, the design is based on the selection of equipment which are commonly available in the local market. The head of the submersible pump is 50 m from surface level, and the amount of water production from Reverse Osmosis Unit is about 600 liters per hour. The total installed PV capacity for pumping system is 980 Wp, and for desalination system is 10. 89 kWp.