Poseidon Water to collaborate with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory to research and develop new water technologies

Poseidon Water today announced a collaboration with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) to support the development of new water technologies to lower the energy requirements, environmental impacts, and costs of water treatment. Poseidon has offered to share access and operating data from the Carlsbad and proposed Huntington Beach desalination facilities to allow for the development and testing of new water technologies.

“Poseidon Water hopes to lead the advancement of new water treatment technologies, and has significant experience and assets necessary to develop, pilot, scale up, and implement new water technologies,” said Carlos Riva, CEO of Poseidon Water. “Building on our position as an industry leader, Poseidon has an interest in leveraging our resources to help develop more efficient water technologies.”

Poseidon’s Carlsbad Desalination Plant has produced over 22 billion gallons of drinking water since starting commercial operations in December 2015. With the capacity to produce 50 MGD, the Carlsbad facility is the largest and most technically advanced, energy efficient and environmentally sound desalination facility in the Western Hemishpere.  Poseidon was recently recognized by San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) as an “Energy Champion” for 2016 for their investments in, and commitment to, sustainability and energy efficiency at the Claude “Bud” Lewis Carlsbad Desalination Plant in Carlsbad, CA.

“California has had a history of pioneering technology partnerships in the area of water, and working with Poseidon to advance the latest in desalination technology for the benefit of our state and the nation is intended to further research in this area,” said Dr. Peter S. Fiske, Director of the Water-Energy Resilience Research Institute at Berkeley Lab.

Poseidon’s proposed 50 MGD facility in Huntington Beach, CA is in the late stages of permitting.  While the reverse osmosis process to be used by Poseidon’s seawater desalination facilities does not emit greenhouse gases, Poseidon has voluntarily committed to offsetting 100% of the proposed Huntington Beach Desalination Plant’s direct and indirect GHG emissions from the electricity grid through either the purchase of renewable power or the purchase of carbon offsets.   The Huntington Beach Project will be the first large-scale desalination facility in the world to include 1mm (1/25th inch, approximately the thickness of a credit card) slot width seawater intake screens and through-screen water velocity of less than 0.5 feet per second in an open-ocean setting. The plant will also include state-of-the-art diffuser technology that will ensure that the salinity level in the plant’s seawater discharge meets the State Water Board’s stringent new receiving water quality requirements. These technologies will minimize the intake and mortality of all forms of marine life.