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Peruvian project on the Pacific coast shows how submarine engineering, reverse osmosis, and sanitation networks can transform saltwater into daily supply for tourist and residential districts south of Lima, with sufficient scale to serve permanent residents and temporary population.
In the south of Lima, the Provisur project has put into operation a desalination structure that captures water from the Pacific Ocean and transforms it into drinking water for Punta Hermosa, Punta Negra, San Bartolo, and Santa María del Mar.
Through reverse osmosis, the plant achieves an average capacity of 34,560 cubic meters per day, equivalent to 34.56 million liters daily, according to Tedagua, the concessionaire responsible for the implementation and operation of the system.
Conceived as part of an integrated water and sanitation infrastructure, the project goes beyond a plant installed by the seaside, as it combines supply, sewage, wastewater treatment, and submarine structures for capture and disposal.
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In the four districts served, the system responds to a demand marked by permanent housing, tourism, and seasonal population increase, especially in coastal areas that receive a higher flow of people during peak periods.
According to the concessionaire, Provisur benefits about 100,000 people, considering permanent and temporary residents in this coastal strip south of the Peruvian capital, where the pressure for basic services accompanies urban and tourist occupation.
How Pacific water becomes drinking water
It all starts at the ocean intake, a structure installed to capture the saltwater in the Pacific and direct this volume to the treatment plant, where the stage responsible for transforming seawater into a resource suitable for consumption occurs.
After capture, the flow proceeds to the reverse osmosis process, a technology in which specific membranes separate salts and impurities, allowing the water previously unsuitable for drinking to be treated within human supply standards.
With the treatment completed, the final production enters the networks planned to distribute the resource to the served districts, integrating the industrial stage of desalination with the urban system responsible for delivering drinking water to the population.
In this chain, the submarine emissaries fulfill an essential function, as they are part of the capture and rejection structures installed in the marine environment to enable both the intake of raw water and the controlled disposal of waste.
According to Tedagua on its Spanish page, these structures were planned in the technical design of the project to connect the ocean to the treatment plant, ensuring that the operation depends on maritime and terrestrial infrastructure working continuously.
In practice, desalination requires pumps, pipelines, control systems, and permanent operation, because the water needs to be extracted from the sea, conducted, treated, stored, and distributed without the plant operating isolated from urban networks.
Desalination in Peru integrated with sanitation
Provisur was contracted to expand and improve the supply of drinking water and sanitation services in the southern districts of Lima, with Sedapal, the company responsible for water and sewage in the Peruvian capital, as the client.
Within this package, the desalination plant has an average capacity of 34,560 cubic meters per day, while the wastewater treatment plant reaches 15,552 cubic meters per day, forming an integrated sanitation strategy.
In addition to the production of drinking water, the system includes the construction of a new wastewater treatment station and the rehabilitation of two existing structures, expanding the project’s impact on the complete sanitation cycle.
Thus, the initiative is not limited to bringing water to the taps, as it also involves the collection, treatment, and disposal of effluents generated by the population served in the four coastal districts south of Lima.
For the desalinated water to reach users, the distribution network became another decisive component of the project, as the plant’s production depends on networks capable of connecting the treatment to the consumption points.
According to the concessionaire’s data, the project added 214 kilometers of drinking water pipelines and 134 kilometers of sewage networks, in addition to planning maintenance on 23 kilometers of water network that were in good condition.
First Peruvian experience with seawater
Presented by Tedagua as Peru’s first experience in using seawater desalination for potable supply, Provisur was completed in 2020 and became part of the sanitation system of the southern coast of Lima.
This aspect makes the project relevant in a country with an extensive coastline but with challenges of water availability in certain urban regions, where the ocean is nearby without being, by itself, a direct source of consumption.
In the case of the districts served, proximity to the Pacific allowed for the transformation of an abundant but salty source into an alternative supply after advanced treatment and connection to existing distribution networks.
In different coastal regions around the world, reverse osmosis has come to be used when traditional freshwater sources do not meet demand, especially in places where urban pressure requires new supply alternatives.
In Provisur, the highlight is the application of this technology in a public supply system, with seawater capture, industrial treatment, urban distribution, and integration with sewage infrastructure.
Even with the ocean in front of the served districts, converting salty water into a potable resource depends on heavy engineering, continuous operation, and quality control at each stage of the desalination process.
Urban networks bring treated water to the districts
Punta Hermosa, Punta Negra, San Bartolo, and Santa María del Mar are located in a coastal strip where the Pacific is part of urban routine, but seawater only comes into direct use after industrial treatment.
The scale of 34.56 million liters per day helps translate the dimension of the work for the general public, as it transforms a technical data in cubic meters into a clearer measure of daily production.
Instead of relying solely on the plant installation, the supply requires connection to networks, storage, sewage collection, and wastewater treatment, keeping desalination integrated into the territory that needs to receive the service.
As it traverses a structure that starts in the marine environment and ends in urban networks, the water captured from the Pacific goes through a technological chain capable of transforming a salty resource into potable supply for Peruvian coastal districts.
