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Watts and Drops: Co-Scheduling Power and Water in Desalination Plants

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  • Ahmed S. Alahmed
  • Audun Botterud
  • Saurabh Amin
  • Ali T. Al-Awami

Abstract

We develop a mathematical framework to jointly schedule water and electricity in a profit-maximizing renewable colocated water desalination plant that integrates both thermal and membrane based technologies. The price-taking desalination plant sells desalinated water to a water utility at a given price and engages in bidirectional electricity transactions with the grid, purchasing or selling power based on its net electricity demand. We show that the optimal scheduling policy depends on the plant's internal renewable generation and follows a simple threshold structure. Under the optimal policy, thermal based water output decreases monotonically with renewable output, while membrane based water output increases monotonically. We characterize the structure and intuition behind the threshold policy and examine key special properties.

Suggested Citation

  • Ahmed S. Alahmed & Audun Botterud & Saurabh Amin & Ali T. Al-Awami, 2025. "Watts and Drops: Co-Scheduling Power and Water in Desalination Plants," Papers 2509.19243, arXiv.org.
    • Handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2509.19243
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Santhosh, Apoorva & Farid, Amro M. & Youcef-Toumi, Kamal, 2014. "Real-time economic dispatch for the supply side of the energy-water nexus," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 42-52.
    2. Moazeni, Faegheh & Khazaei, Javad & Pera Mendes, Joao Paulo, 2020. "Maximizing energy efficiency of islanded micro water-energy nexus using co-optimization of water demand and energy consumption," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 266(C).
    3. Ahmed S. Alahmed & Lang Tong, 2023. "Dynamic Net Metering for Energy Communities," Papers 2306.13677, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2024.
    4. Ghaithan, Ahmed M. & Mohammed, Awsan & Al-Hanbali, Ahmad & Attia, Ahmed M. & Saleh, Haitham, 2022. "Multi-objective optimization of a photovoltaic-wind- grid connected system to power reverse osmosis desalination plant," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 251(C).
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