60 Omanis to undergo training to operate desalination plants

Muscat: Ten state-of-the-art desalination plants will be up and running in Oman by 2020 with the aim to produce 52 million gallons of water per day to support the nation’s rapidly expanding needs. There’s only one problem – staff.
As the new desalination plants will require Omanis to operate them, 60 Omani graduates have been selected to undergo training with the MEDRC Water Research's Tahlya Training Programme. The lucky 60 were whittled down from an original list of 4,500 applicants.
They will be sponsored by BP Oman to undergo training in reverse osmosis desalination as operators and supervisors.
“The aim is to enable young Omanis with these skills to be supervisors and operators as Oman’s water desalination industry develops progressively,” said Engineer Yousuf Al Ojaili, President of BP Oman.
“Investing in such initiatives supports the development of a competent national workforce to pilot evolving industries as future contributors to the national economy,” he added.
“This programme will train at least 40 operators and 20 supervisors, who will receive world class hands-on training on the only purpose-built desalination training and research plant in the region,” said Engineer Riadh Dridi, Head of Training at the MEDRC.
Desalination plants are being developed in Salalah, A’Sharqiyah, Duqm, Barka and Sohar.