Characterizing the fossil fuel impacts in water desalination plants in Kuwait: A Life Cycle Assessment approach

This study provides a detailed quantified baseline for the environmental effects of desalination in Kuwait. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is applied to model the environmental impacts of all nine desalination plant in the country both using Multistage Flash Desalination (MSF) and Reverse osmosis technologies at two scales: per one ton and on annual production. Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) is used to investigate which fossil fuel types is significantly contributing to increased environmental burden of desalination. The results indicate that although 12.2% of Kuwait's electrical energy is generated using crude oil, crude oil alone contributes 63% to the global warming. The results also show that desalination in Kuwait contributes 7.89E+08 kg Sb eq. to abiotic depletion, 1.15E+08 kg SO2 eq. to acidification, 1.91E+07 kg PO4 eq. to eutrophication, 2.71E+10 kg CO2 eq. to global warming, 2.47E+04 kg CFC-11 eq. to ozone layer depletion, 6.45E+09 kg 1,4-DB eq. to human toxicity, 6.03E+12 kg 1,4-DB eq. to marine aquatic ecotoxicity, and 7.53E+06 kg C2H4 eq. to photochemical oxidation. ANOVA reveals that natural gas has the lowest environmental impact, except on abiotic depletion; and that crude oil contributes almost four times more to global warming than other fuels used.