By John — Desalination News
A multi-year research project at Oman’s Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) has mapped the oceanographic and biological conditions that drive harmful algal blooms (HABs) along the country’s northern coast, offering desalination operators in the Gulf of Oman a clearer early-warning picture of a threat that has already crippled plants elsewhere in the region. Unlike the ongoing, headline-grabbing algae crisis that has repeatedly knocked out Mediterranean desalination plants in Israel this year, this is a research effort aimed at prediction and prevention rather than crisis response.
The project, led by Prof. Sergey Dobretsov — who holds Oman’s UNESCO Chair in Marine Biotechnology — and based in SQU’s College of Agricultural and Marine Sciences and its Centre of Excellence in Marine Biotechnology, found that blooms along Oman’s northern coast are shaped by an interacting set of physical processes: seasonal monsoon winds, ocean currents, coastal upwelling, outflow from the Arabian Gulf, and internal tides and eddies. Seasonal mixing and the depth of the thermocline — the boundary layer separating warmer surface water from colder water below — govern how much nutrient reaches the surface and how much phytoplankton biomass results.
The researchers documented a shift toward diatom-dominated blooms starting in 2018–2019, with Noctiluca scintillans emerging as a major bloom-forming species in the region. They also profiled the bacterial communities associated with blooms, finding that Bacillus was the most abundant group and that bacterial populations differ measurably between bloom and non-bloom periods — including the detection of some potentially pathogenic strains, a detail with direct relevance to intake-water safety at coastal plants.
For desalination operators, the practical stakes are straightforward: algal biomass and the organic matter blooms leave behind accelerate membrane fouling, raising both maintenance frequency and operating costs, while severe blooms can force intake reductions or full shutdowns — the same basic failure mode that has sidelined multiple Israeli plants intermittently since late summer. The SQU team’s recommendations lean on monitoring rather than shutdown: continuous tracking of chlorophyll-a, turbidity, dissolved oxygen, and harmful species concentrations at plant intake points, combined with optimized pretreatment and pre-planned contingency protocols — reducing intake volume, temporarily suspending operations, or switching to an alternate water source — rather than discovering a bloom only after it has already fouled an intake.
The research, funded through Oman’s Research and Innovation Authority Strategic Research Programme in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Water Resources, has so far produced four peer-reviewed publications, ten conference presentations, and three workshops. Oman relies on desalination for an estimated 86% of its drinking water, making reliable, early detection of bloom conditions — rather than reactive plant shutdowns after the fact — a matter of basic water security rather than an academic exercise.
(Source: Times of Oman)