Halcrow Water Services

Desalination in History

Although there can be no doubt that simple distillation was undertaken successfully at some time not long after the 4th Century BC, the first recorded application appears to be during the early part of the 17th Century by Japanese sailors who used earthenware pots to boil seawater, and bamboo tubes to collect the condensate. Even here, heat was not wasted. When the seawater used to cool the tubes became too hot to provide efficient condensation, it was transferred to the evaporator. Descendants of these early vessels survive as ‘Ranbiki’, and find common use in many traditional Japanese restaurants.

In the 1790’s, secretary of state Thomas Jefferson was asked to investigate claims that a new ‘desalting process’ (by chemical addition / distillation) could provide fresh water to the infant American Navy at a much lower cost than conventional distillation.

The early development of desalination has closely followed that of steam generators and steam engines, and it should be no surprise that the first dedicated machines were adaptations of these. There are many claims to the world’s first ‘commercial’ desalination plant, the most likely being that commissioned at Tigne, Sliema, on the island of Malta in 1881.

In 1907, the Ottoman Turks installed Saudi Arabia’s first desalination plant in Jeddah. It was replaced in 1928 and now serves an artistic role as one of Jeddah’s famous traffic island sculptures. Its British origin has survived in its name,‘Al Kindasah’, an obvious transliteration of its function.