The economic feasibility of seawater desalination over the global scale: assessment of the production cost development and national water price until 2050
As many countries are suffering water scarcity due to the climate change and human activities, seawater desalination using reverse osmosis (SWRO) has shown to be a progressively promising countermeasure to satisfy the growing water demand. Therefore, the economic feasibility assessment of SWRO will be beneficial for the potential investors and policy-makers of government. In present study, it have proposed a systematic method to evaluate the economic feasibility of implementing SWRO in 140 counties and further estimated the potential future diffusion of SWRO over global scale by 2050. To the purpose, two models has been separately developed to simulate the production cost of SWRO and conventional water price, which are identified as the critical economic factors for feasibility evaluation of SWRO. These two models were firstly applied to historical validation in which proven to be able to well simulate both these two economic factors, and then were applied globally for future simulation over the period of 2015-2050 under three socioeconomic scenarios, i.e. SSP (Shared Socioeconomic Pathways) 1-3. Basin on the estimated production cost and water price, the economic feasibility of adopting SWRO coupling with its future potentialities were carefully evaluated. As a result, it indicated that SWRO was expected to be cost-effectively adopted in more countries by 2050, especially in these developing countries. The significant potential diffusion of SWRO in countries was mainly attributed to both the diminishing production cost and the increasing conventional water price as a result of income growth globally in three SSPs scenarios.
各種検索
サポート
ヘルプ