Design decisions and cost estimates - FRP water lines in Middle East

[PlannerTom]

We are at the beginning of route planning and a cost estimate for some developing areas in the Middle East that are in need of fresh water. I am trying to assess the pros and cons of installation of multiple 1-meter diameter surface-laid FRP water lines vice 3-meter surface-laid or buried lines over two routes, one of 850 km with a rise and fall of more than 1,000 meters and the second route of 1,000 km across a desert plain.

Our goal is to distribute 2 BCM (billion cubic meters) of water per year from each of two sites (4 BCM total), growing to four water source areas over the next 10 years. Route Number One would release water to consumers National Water Authorities at three points along the route, and terminate in mostly agricultural uses. Route Number Two will have smaller users at approximately every 100 kilometers and terminate in a large urban area where it will be linked with Route Number One.

Does anyone have some lessons learned on this type of work or with these diameter lines for those distances in the Middle East? What did your final costs per installed kilometer of water pipe cost? Would you have run multiple lines if you could do it again?

Thank you for any tips or advice you have. This project is far from being locked in. If approved, it will bring water to some low-cost areas that really need the water badly. Our success will depend on our keeping both the initial capital investment and O&M costs down.

 

[cub3bead]

Have you talked to Future Pipe Industries yet?

http://www.futurepipe.com/

They started out in the ME and have a good product.

I would be a bit concerned about surface laying of FRP pipe for security of supply issues for municipal drinking water.

You will also have to make sure the pipe is completely opaque to keep algae from growing on the inside.

 

[PlannerTom]

I haven't talked to FuturePipe yet. I did make an inquiry to them a week ago via their website, but haven't heard back yet.

We were going to trench the pipe as we got close to built-up areas, but trenching for such a distance through some of the more rocky terrain seemed daunting. But we had not discussed the opacity of FRP before and so had not considered the algae problem. That is certainly something to discuss with the FRP manufacturers. Thank you for the tip.

 

[cvg]

I would be concerned with surface laying of any type of pipe for security reasons. What is the thermal expansion of FRP? Would excessive expansion and contraction due to large variations in temperature at the desert surface be a concern? Installation in a trench would reduce it to much lower levels.

 

[BRIS]

You can surface install GRP -

The Middle East is big place and your solution will depend on location. From 30 years experience of installation of water transfer projects in the middles east I have learned that each country has its own preferences and prejudices. There is no point trying to sell GRP in Kuwait or Bahrain. Libya uses PCCP, Qatar ductile iron, Kuwait is trying steel bur is really stuck on DI. Lebanon proposed a mix of GRP, DI and Steel for its Conveyor 800 but the financers (Kuwait) require DI in place of GRP. i.e the politics and preferences carry as much if not more weight than the cost and technical benefits. Pipes above or below ground also depend on preferences, politics and environmental issuers. I assume you will be doing an environmental impact assessment

Environmental conditions vary hugely across the ME. The capital rich developed ME countries have learned from experience to invest huge sums in capital expenditure to provide redundancy and reliability. They will never accept a single source of supply. The developing countries either still have this lesson to learn or don't have the capital to invest in security. They are relying on single sources and single pipelines. I recently deigned triple 1.2 m dia conveyance pipelines for Kuwait but single 2.2 m dia for Lebanon. Libya's great man made River Project relies on single 4.0m diameter PCCP pipes to feed many areas, but they are now busy investing further $ billions security.

You are not going to produce your feasibility study for a major pipeline system as you describe from questions on the internet or from advice from Future Pipe Industries (good as they are). You need a six month study with expert inputs. I would be happy to lead it for you!

 

[BRIS]

PS -.Qatar has a GDP/person of $58,000. Yemen has a GDP/Person of $700. Qatar uses buried DI pipe with tape wrapping, CP if needed etc. Yemen screws together 8in Chinese manufactured GI and throws it on the surface.

 

[BRIS]

PPS 4 BCM/year = 11 MCMD = 126 m3/sec
That is approximately the supply capacity of all 4 phases of the Libyan Great Man Made River Project - Implementation time - 20 years - cost $200 billion.

The economics of providing water for agriculture are negative - i.e the costs exceed the revenues.

I think your numbers are out of scale??
(100 by 1.0m dia pipelines ?)

 

[PlannerTom]

BRIS -
Scale,...scale, what's that? You must be referring to the whitish build-up on the inside of those calcified pipes.
I've already sent your replies to my boss so that he can see some of the challenges we are up against. He is coming to Europe towards the end of next week so I can talk to him about this elephant we're trying to eat. He's an architect and urban planner who has some civil engineers working for him, but I don't know if any of them have experience with true long-distance water transport pipelines.
You can see their other work, which is mostly bridge, road, rail and urban development (if the website is working today, it wasn't yesterday...), at <

http://www.noorcities.com>.

They are focused on the other work right now which gives me time to further develop this concept. But for everything there are only so many windows of opportunity.
Also, my hat's off to you for the work on the Great Man-Made River Project. How long do they think that aquifer will last? Is it a matter of decades or centuries?

 

[BRIS]

I have worked on intermittently on GMRP over 20 years. Not all our pipes are calcified, only the downstream lengths!

The well-field was expected to give 50 years service life, but based on past rates of development of water utilisation it will last for ever. The project started supply in 1992, but It is still at only at 15% of design capacity. Hence there is no discernable aquifer draw down to date. Water quality is a problem.

I would be interested to know which project you are looking at. I worked on water resource assessmenmts in Yemen last year - politically for Aden the only solution is desalination. All the available resource is used in growing Ghat. Aquifers there are overpummed resulting in saline intrusion.

 

[PlannerTom]

In the website above you can see the parent company is building a bridge across the Red Sea at the Bab el Mandeb, between Yemen and Djibouti. They will then add 5,000 kilometers of road and rail. More amazingly, they want to build a city for 2.1 million people from scratch - If they can overcome the khat (ghat) problem. If you have recommendations on how to fight that, I'm sure they'd listen. Check out the website.
------------------------------------

This project is to move water from Turkey and Northern Iraq to Syria, Jordan and Palestine while on its way to Saudi Arabia and the UAE/Dubai. The system must be a network so that the loss of a single source or single line to man-made or natural disaster does not cause catastrophic system failure. Thus, its a water network, as opposed to just a pipeline.

We toyed with the idea of describing it as a "trans-national utility", but that sounds too much like you might expect a huge profit. Everyone knows such massive infrastructure work can only be done as a private-public partnership. The backers have to make their profit, but you can't provide enough freshwater to the public without public funding. The traditional farmer doesn't believe he's using $5K of water to grow $200 of wheat. So we will try to deliver the water while helping the national authorities modernize agriculture and adopt "best practices" wherever possible.

In the first phase, the principle water drop off points probably would be Aleppo, Damascus, Amman, the West Bank and Gaza. The relevant national authorities will give us specific guidance. BTW - This is NOT the old "Peace Pipeline" of a few years ago that was only to supply Israel with Turkish water. We see a developed network with "Water Stations" along the main line at Damascus and Amman, as well as along the secondary supply line at Tadmur (Palmyra), Syria and somewhere east of Azrak, Jordan. This would possibly make more sense if I could somehow show you the graphics..., but we can't post them publicly yet.

In a later phase of the project, water storage farms would be constructed on rural high ground, when possible in the vicinity of the Water Stations. The purpose of these stations would be in apportionment and balancing the lines going east, south east and southwest, especially during periods of high usage or drought. The water storage effort has to be done separately as it is as big a project as the initial water transport.

One of the design drivers in this project is to use Western technology with in a Middle Eastern architectural style. The Lift, Pump and Water Stations would be open to the public as a local source for smaller quantities of water, electricity and broad bandwidth internet access. One of the reasons we were considering FRP is so that we could run the other utilities along with them.

Our Water Stations are to be welcoming and will tie into local developmental efforts to become resources for both agriculture (crop options, best irrigation practices and marketing) and general public education (electrical power and internet links to the Noor City 'Knowledge Hub'). This is part of the social and economic payback for the national burden sharing from appropriation of rights-of-way and state funds.

We are also looking at the cost of self-generation of power through renewable energy sources (wind and solar) with a local conventional generator back-up. To start off with we will use the grid where we have to, but in remote areas we will be the grid.

I'm not involved directly in the funding. If there's a reasonable way to do it, money can be found. But first, we need a valid and "briefable" concept for both our backers and the national decision-makers.

OK - Your thoughts?

 

[BRIS]

The peace pipeline - its been looking for funding for 15 years -

 

[PlannerTom]

BRIS,

I hear your warning and I hope its only skepticism and not cynicism. Too much practical experience in the Middle East can affect anyone's optimism. But look at the 'miracle in the desert' you've accomplished.

We believe the "Peace Pipeline" failed because the regional funding sources had issues with Israel becoming the primary beneficiary of the effort. OK - They are not the centerpiece of our effort. My boss is originally from the region and is sensitive to those issues. But the borderline waters of Palestine and Israel are their concern, not ours. Their officials have recognized their mutual points of concern on the matter back in 2000 at the Olso II Peace Accords. Good enough.

As you know the situation in the MENA, you understand that people are growing more and more desperate for fresh water. These urban populations are growing rapidly and many have already reached water scarcity levels. The World Bank regional water projections for 2025 are sobering.

In some more fortunate areas, water trucks try to relieve the shortages of the public systems, but that is not a long-term solution. Other related issues - Farmers don't understand why it is necessary to cut off their fields so early in the summer. Some great work has been done with slowing losses of UFW (Unaccounted for Water), but its not enough.

While we are dealing with national leaders, we will not address political issues. We are not equipped to do so and cannot afford to. Water simply has to make good, no - in fact it has to make overwhelming economic sense to the users. We are not trading water for peace. We are transporting it for fundamental human reasons; health and prosperity. If any peace grows from that, it is incidental to our efforts.

In some places where aid money is available, like central Iraq and Gaza, we can't physically build the solutions now because you need stability to do work. (Even really good contractors tend to get sloppy and drop things when shot at.) However, we can work as far as we can to bring water nearby and connect it when it is time.

For those who have no other choice, hauling water from a water terminal is an acceptable solution. But if we wait until it is "safe" everywhere, it may be too late. So, we've got to start with a system backbone soon, and either finish the branch lines later or leave it to others to finish. Even a partial infrastructure would bring relief to many millions in Syria and Jordan.

We don't know how far we can go. Fortunately, a network can be designed in sections and modules. We have got to show water flowing from one point to a place where its needed within 5 years. It has to turn a profit for the private investors. Each nation, suppliers and consumers, has to see their own interests being served. Hopefully, success breeds success. Once the water is serving some, it can be expanded to serve others.

Thanks for your comments. You always give me more to think about.

 

[BRIS]

I think we are in danger of being accused of straying off topic and abusing the forum. However, I would be keen to continue the discussion by e-mail brains399@yahoo.co.uk

Back to your original post.

GRP/FRP pipe can be used above ground. If exposed to solar radsiation for long periods the epoxy resin will powder and expose the fibres. You need to provide an additional resin coat (1.00 mm thick) to account for this. Also a polyurethane paint coat which will need to re applied at 10 year intervals +/1

However, after taking into account expansion, support, anchors and other problems it will probably be cheaper to bury it.

We are installing a 1.6 m dia conveyance which is working out at $1.5 million/km inclusive of everything (pump stations, control, operation and maintenance facilities)

I would adopt dual pipelines rather than single. In desert environments whatever can go wrong will go wrong. Also I find for most of these projects nobody considers how it will operate when demand/supply is less than design.

 

[BRIS]

It was the intention of the peace pipeline to supply the region not just Israel. When I last looked at the economics the difference in costs of supply by pipeline v desalination were marginal. Desalination has the advantage of being under national control. Other factors are the Disi pipeline in Jordan and the proposed Gulf pipeline between Iran and Kuwait with branches to KSA.

It is interesting to compare economics of water supply to poor developing countries with those of the oil rich. In sub Sahara Africa the break even point for irrigation development is about $12,000/ha. Above that the internal rate of return is too low to obtain international funding. (i.e it is cheaper to give food aid than it is to finance and maintain development to grow food). In Libya investment costs in water supply alone are in the order of $150,000/ha. In Lebanon the cost of the Conveyor 800 project is grossly out of proportion with the potential returns. The farmers can’t even market the crops they grow now.
I would consider it a much greater accomplishment to invest $300 million at $20,000/ha to supply water in sub Sahara Africa to subsistence farmers giving a neutral rate of return than to invest $2.5 billion at $150,000 ha to supply water to “hobby” farmers in the ME. But I am also not a philanthropist so I work a lot more in the ME than I do in Africa!

 

[PlannerTom]

BRIS,

We also like the idea of multiple pipelines. One, for maintenance. Two, for future growth. Three, for contingencies. Fourth, there could even be different quality levels (ie. domestic quality) running through different lines. In Oklahoma we once had a town with two water towers, one labeled "Hot" and the other "Cold".

You are probably right about the relative merits of how and where to invest water funding for agriculture. No one can say they are "against" agriculture, but it is certainly the competition first felt in the supply line balance with urban areas. Most of these countries have done a good job in getting the word out on drip irrigation and in making low-cost farm improvement loans available. The difficulty comes in breaking old paradigms of trench irrigation for some traditional crops.

Desalinization, however good for some areas, still faces the problem of transporting the water into non-coastal arid areas. Certainly, even if Jordan and Syria were to use their coastline access to the sea, the distance to their urban areas would still require long pipelines. So, they would incur the larger part of the costs of both systems.

It would seem that pipelines and desalinization plants could be mutually supportive though. For most plants, brackish water is substantially cheaper to process than salt water. And for pipelines that are carrying raw agricultural water, they still require water processing before it will be ready for domestic consumption. Do you know - Has anyone piped raw fresh water to a desalinization plant, either to reduce the cost of on-going saltwater desalinization or to purify the raw fresh water, or both?

So, here's a question - Given the need for security, future growth, maintenance - what is the optimal 1,000 KM pipeline configuration for moving 2 to 3 BCM of water per year? You may use a calculator, but you must show your work.

Also, I have contacted the Forum Administrator in an effort to figure out how to send you some slides that have proprietary information on them that I'm not allowed to post publicly. I tried brains399 and that didn't work.

 

[BRIS]

Sorry: brians399@yahoo.co.uk

There are plenty of desalination plants desalinating inland brackish water. In any case desalinated water needs to be blended with brackish water to produce fresh water. Typically 15% brackish water to 85% desalinated in the ME Gulf states. with a higher quality less saline source you could say blend 50/50.

3 BCM/yr is 2.7 MCMD. our twin 4.0m diameter phase 1 pipeline (800 km ) long can deliver 2 MCMD under gravity flow and 3.6 MCMD under pumped flow conditions.

If you are using GRP you will need at least six 2.2 m dia. pipelines to get your 3 BCM a year.

To get anything like an economic solution you need to run the pipes at full capacity 365 days per year. Unfortunately irrigation demands are not constant for 365 days per year.

The other factor is that your supply of about 31 m3/sec (3 BCM) is sufficient to irrigate say 40,000 ha which is nothing in terms of the investment.

To get anything like an economic return you need to use the water in supply to high value enterprises not waste it on agriculture (a brewery would make a good return in the ME albeit illegal). (It is cheaper to grow the produce at the water source and transport the produce to the consumer than transport the water to grow the produce).

 

[PlannerTom]

Actually, the Jordanians used to have two beer breweries, but the demand in a country that is 90% Muslim doesn't justify linking the pipeline directly to those factories.

Thanks for the other info.