Environmental Impact of brine disposal to the sea : case study : Deir El-Balah SWRO plant

Other Title(s)

الأثر البيئي للمحلول الملحي الخارج من محطة تحلية دير البلح على البحر

Dissertant

al-Tawil, Hasan Ahmad

Thesis advisor

al-Mughir, Yunus Khalil

Comitee Members

Abu al-Tayf, Mazin Taha
Qahman, Khalid Ahmad

University

Islamic University

Faculty

Faculty of Engineering

Department

Department of Civil Engineering

University Country

Palestine (Gaza Strip)

Degree

Master

Degree Date

2015

English Abstract

Water desalination plants produce huge amounts of reject brine, which are usually sent back to the sea, where they could, in the long run, result in detrimental effects on the aquatic life as well as the quality of the seawater in the area.

The major goal of this study is to investigate the effect of brine disposal of Deir El- Balah desalination plant on the quality of seawater.

The negative impact relatively features with high temperature, high salinity and low dissolved oxygen in water.

This study was conducted on the status-quo of Deir El-Balah desalination plant.

The capacity of Deir El-Balah desalination plant today is around 2600 m3/d with a recovery rate of 42%.

It depends in water desalination whether on the saline well that was drilled in the plant or the beach wells.

The study focused on figuring out the characteristics of the seawater in its natural status without the effect of brine by considering a reference point (R) which is 1600 m away from the south of the disposal point.

In addition, the characteristics of the seawater in the discharge area after the Brine discharge were studied and the difference in the measured parameters refering to the reference point R was observed.

It is noteworthy that the study was through two seasons of the year, summer and autumn and the process of sampling was done in three rounds in total of thirty points distributed within an area of 200 m2 surrounding the brine disposal point.

Seawater parameters that are the most important in this issue, salinity (measured by EC), temperature, dissolved oxygen (DO), turbidity and pH were measured according to the previous studies due to its effect on the seawater quality and the marine life.

After the analysis of the above-mentioned parameters, the study explained that brine of Deir El-Balah desalination plant has no effect on the seawater quality, since the maximum values from the three rounds measurement of EC, temperature, DO, Turbidity, and pH are 60.2 mS/ cm, 29.4 Co, 9.2 mg/l, 5.36 NTU, 8.349 respectively.

This may be due to the small volume of the brine quantity that is resulted from the desalination process which is considered relatively little to influence the seawater and represents nothing comparing with the physical and chemical continuous changes in the seawater.

The study has recommended that all environment interested authorities as environment quality authority and other responsible institutions should conduct monitoring and evaluation programs for large scale desalination plant and using modeling to simulate reality precisely throughout the year, in order to know the best options to build desalination stations that neither affects the seawater quality nor causes negative effect on the sea environment.

Main Subjects

Earth Sciences, Water and Environment

Topics

• Saline water
• Palestine
• Water treatment plants
• Deir al-Balah

No. of Pages

113

Table of Contents

• APA
• MLA
• AMA

Language

English

Data Type

Arab Theses

Record ID

BIM-610418