Ahmedabad firm plans Dubai plant

Dubai's world famous man-made island, the Palm Jumeirah, now has a Gujarat connection. Ahmedabad-based water management firm, Doshion Ltd, has done its bit by bagging a contract for setting up a water treatment plant with a capacity to produce 7 lakh litre remineralised water per hour for the island.

The Palm Jumeirah island is part of Dubai's ambitious project to develop 4 man-made islands on its coast. The islands are being developed by Dubai-based real estate developer Nakheel.

Doshion bagged the order from Acwa Emirates LLC, a West Asian company, which holds the contract for engineering, procurement and construction of the island.

Ashit Doshi, managing director of the company, said, "We have beaten Singapore-based Hyflux Ltd, one of the Asia's largest water solutions companies, to secure this bid. The water remineralisation plant will be fully operational by June-July 2007."

However, he did not reveal the worth of the contract.

On the need to remineralise water on the Palm Jumeirah, G Viswanathan, director of the company, said, "The Palm islands get water by desalinating the sea water. However, by undergoing this process, the sea water loses some of its vital minerals and is not so healthy to drink. Besides, it corrodes the pipelines. The remineralisation process gives back the lost minerals to the water and it becomes drinkable."

The company, as part of its efforts to strengthen overseas presence, had recently completed setting up of a demineralisation plant for Mitsubishi, which is setting up a 4,400-Mw power plant for Taiwan Power Corporation, Viswanathan said.

This apart, the company is executing two projects in Vietnam, which involves setting up of a complete water treatment and utility facility at Camau.

The company is also setting up a water treatment and demineralisation plant in Indonesia for a Japanese EPC contractor company Marubeni Corporation.

Back home, Doshion had set up a desalinasation plant at Tirupur for the Tamil Nadu Water Supply and Drainage Board two years ago. This plant provides drinking water to nearly 300 surrounding villages.