Middle East Purchases Will Help Boost Cross-flow Membrane System
Sales To Over $10 billion In 2010
Significant percentages of Middle East oil revenues will be invested in infrastructure including desalination using reverse osmosis. These investments will help boost world wide revenues of cross-flow membrane systems to over $10 billion in 2010. Half of that total will be for reverse osmosis systems and the other half split between ultrafiltration and microfiltration. This is the latest forecast in the online McIlvaine, RO/UF/MF World Markets.
Desalination will account for 20 percent of the revenues, whereas pharmaceutical and biotechnology applications will account for 10 percent. The food industry, which purifies the water it uses and also uses membranes to separate liquids in processes, will account for 14 percent of the purchases.
The amount of available renewable water per capita in countries throughout the Middle East and North Africa region is 20 per cent of what it is in the rest of the world, with 80 per cent falling below the international water scarcity threshold of 1,000 cubic meters per person per annum.
Water coverage is also limited with the potable water network reaching an average of 75 percent of the population in these countries. Conventional water availability has remained static while demand continues to increase sharply due to rapid population growth, increase in household income, and irrigation development.
At the same time, many of the Middle East countries have the highest consumption rates per capita in the world. For example, in the UAE consumption per person (around 570 litres per person a day) is over three times the world average. By 2025 regional average water availability will be just over 500 cubic meters per person per year compared to the world average of 7,000.
With rising incomes and standard of living, there is a substantial expansion of infrastructure. The availability of salt water and the cost effectiveness of membrane desalination is resulting in large numbers of projects.
Saudi Arabia ranks second in terms of projected purchases of RO systems by country in 2010. Other Middle East countries are also in the top twenty.
RO System Revenues For Desalination ($ Millions)
Country 2010
United States 716
Saudi Arabia 392
Japan 201
Spain 173
Country 2010
South Korea 87
India 70
Iraq 59
Germany 51
Singapore 46
China 40
United Arab Emirates 37
Libya 35
Italy 31
United Kingdom 30
Egypt 25
Iran 21
Taiwan 20
Other South and
Central America 19
Australia 17
Mexico 16
Israel 16
Tunisia 15
A number of factors will contribute to double-digit growth for cross-flow membranes. They include migration of rural residents to cities in Asia, expansion of biotechnology from pilot to commercial scale, acceleration in coal-fired power plant investments, and applications in nanotechnology.
For more information on RO/UF/MF World Markets, click on: http://www.mcilvainecompany.com/water.html#NO20 .
Bob McIlvaine
847-784-0012