Introduction

This app helps explore and compare the costs and configuration tradeoffs of inland brackish water desalination systems, particularly for agriculture.

It integrates physical and financial models for:

• Desalination energy based on feed salinity, recovery rate, and system efficiency using a simplified reverse osmosis model.
• Solar PV sizing from local climate data (sunshine hours, ambient temperature) and panel characteristics.
• Crop irrigation demand, either via a constant input or a dynamic crop water model using monthly crop coefficients.
• Brine disposal, comparing capital costs of evaporation basins and reinjection borefields.
• Levellised Cost of Water (LCOW), broken down into CAPEX and OPEX components for long-term planning.

The simulation is based on a 30-year dataset of daily climate and electricity data from selected locations across the Murray–Darling Basin.

Getting Started

To perform a basic simulation:

1. Choose a location using the dropdown list (e.g., Loxton, Griffith, Mildura).
2. Set the capacity of the plant using the flow unit slider (L/s, ML/day, GL/year).
3. Adjust key inputs:
   • Water quality (total dissolved solids, TDS in mg/L),
   • Plant lifetime (cost recovery period),
   • Energy source (Grid or Solar PV),
   • Brine disposal method (Evaporation basin or Reinjection),
   • and optionally, Utilisation factor.
4. Go to the Main Output tab to view key results.

Use the Additional Parameters tab if you wish to refine capital, energy, or cost settings.

Documentation

A full technical manual explaining the methodology, assumptions, and limitations will be available here:

[Link to Full Manual]