Business View Caribbean
5
increased capacity, and providing some redundant
systems, so that we can produce the 40 million gal-
lons a day at any time of year. And at certain times of
the year, and when everything’s running, will be able to
produce somewhere in the region of 48 million impe-
rial gallons a day.”
While DesalcoTT is the country’s largest, and only pri-
vate, desalination operator, Thompson reports that
some competition does exist on the island. There’s a
smaller plant at Point Fortin - a public/private partner-
ship between WASA and the U.S.-based Seven Seas
Corporation, that produces 5.5 million U.S. gallons per
day; and a waste water recovery plant that the govern-
ment is the process of building that will have a capac-
ity of 10 million imperial gallons a day. (“You multiply
1.2 from imperial gallons to get U.S., so our 40 mil-
lion gallons a day is actually 48 million U.S. gallons,”
Thompson adds.)
As both General Manager of DesalcoTT, as well as the
President of the Caribbean Desalination Association,
an affiliate of the International Desalination Associa-
tion, Thompson sees desalination as a growth indus-
try. “The number of desalination plants in the world
has been growing exponentially – partially because of
climate change and partially because of increased liv-
ing standards. And the other big factor is that since
the technology of reverse osmosis was invented and
further developed, it’s become much cheaper to de-
salinate water than it used to be. As a rough guide,
conventional water treatment costs somewhere in the
region of 10 U.S. to, maybe 50 U.S. cents per cubic
