WEB SCRAPING FOR BUILDING DATABASE OF DESALINATION PLANTS AND INDICES FOR CONSTRUCTION OF DESALINATION PLANTS IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

Abstract

 Although seawater desalination can be operated steadily without influence of drought, the high costs and technical requirements make it diffiicult to verify the effectiveness of seawater desalination as a means to alleviate water shortages in developing countries. In this study, we have firstly scraped the internet to collect information on desalination plants using a web scraper and made a database on desalination plants. As a result, it was found that, among the world cities of population over 100 thousands, desalimation plants are in operation in 157 cities, in planning in 27 cities, and under construction in one city, totaling 185 cities. Secondly, four indices were selected out of 1, 386 indices of the World Bank, to incidate the likelihood of seawater desalination plants. Using these four indices, it was estimated that there would be 54 million people who would live in cities in developing countries where desalination plants are likely to be commissioned.