Due to the extreme scarcity of water on the island of Cyprus, the Water Development Department (WDD) in Nicosia issued an international call for tenders to construct a seawater desalination facility with a capacity of 40,000 m³/d and an optional capacity extension to 60,000 m³/d.
Cyprus ranks among the warmest regions in the entire Mediterranean area, and has been suffering from an acute shortage of water in recent years as a consequence of the extreme drought. In 2008, the government partly mandated the strict rationing of drinking water. For example, the 160,000 inhabitants of the capital city of Nicosia were only provided with running water every second day for months at a time.
The water will be taken from the sea by a 1.5 kilometre long suction pipe and will then be subject to a pre-purification process in sand filters. The salt will then be removed from the water in a process called seawater reverse osmosis, and finally distributed to a 170 metre high drinking water storage facility by means of a 10.5 kilometre long pressure pipeline.
For WTE, this project represents the second contract awarded by the Republic of Cyprus. Since the beginning of 2008, a wastewater purification plant in Nicosia for 100,000 inhabitants, which was planned and constructed by WTE, has been successfully operated by the WTE Betriebsgesellschaft.
