Compared to the desolation a year ago, the presidential palace on Coro Island was much livelier. Because the outline of the white paint and marble columns resembled the White House and the magnificent subtropical garden, this place was also regarded as one of the tourist attractions by the visitors.
On the lawn in front of the courtyard, Jiang Chen could see bodyguards in suits and sunglasses as well as tourists taking photos.
When Jiang Chen arrived, the chief of staff was already waiting at the door.
In the entire country, only he didn't need to make an appointment to see the president. After explaining the purpose of his visit, the chief of staff respectfully led him into the hall and took him to the office.
There were two people sitting on the sofa in the office.
One of them was Zhang Yaping, but the white man looked unfamiliar to Jiang Chen.
When they saw Jiang Chen come in, the two stood up. Based on the principle of honourable guests first, Zhang Yaping first introduced Jiang Chen.
"This is Jiang Chen, the president of Xin's star company, Future Group. You should have heard of him."
"It's nice to meet you, Mr. Jiang Chen." Smith was wearing a black suit and his beard was clean-shaven. He politely extended his hand to Jiang Chen.
"This is the representative of the UA Matrix Desalination Company, Ludd Smith." Then, Zhang Yaping introduced Mr. Smith to Jiang Chen.
"Hello, Mr. Smith, it's nice to meet you too."
After shaking hands with him, Jiang Chen nodded with a smile and sat down. He then looked at President Zhang Yaping with a questioning gaze.
Sensing the question in his eyes, Zhang Yaping immediately smiled and said, "Here's the thing.
Currently, we plan to build a desalination plant in Xin, so we invited the UA Matrix Desalination Company to do an engineering evaluation for us on Coro Island. "
"Desalination plant? Is there not enough freshwater on the island? "Jiang Chen was surprised.
"Not only is there not enough, Xin has been relying on Australia to import freshwater." Smith took out a stack of documents from his briefcase. "This document is the distribution of groundwater on the island, and this is the location of the water treatment plant."
Jiang Chen had no idea how much he had to pay for utilities at his mansion. He didn't even bother to look at the bill of a few thousand, especially since he always went to the apocalypse. It wasn't until Zhang Yaping mentioned this that he realized the problem.
Before the 20th century, Coro Island was rich in underground freshwater resources. However, with global warming, the sea level rose, and the seawater washed the roads and houses on the island. As a result, the seawater flowed backward and seriously polluted the groundwater. The freshwater resources on the periphery of the island no longer existed. The island could only rely on the groundwater in the center of the island and the small freshwater lake on the neighboring Garin Island for drinking water.
The tropics had a lot of rainfall. Originally, Xin's freshwater resources were sufficient, but with the increase of immigrants and the surge of tourism, the water system that could only supply 50,000 people now had to supply 150,000 people. In order to avoid paying for the expensive water, many tourists even brought backpacks full of mineral water when they traveled.
The locals, on the other hand, had it tough. They could not possibly buy fresh water from Amazon.
Including the workers without citizenship, the current population of Xin increased to 50,000.
Generally speaking, in a well-equipped city, each person needed to consume 400 kilograms of fresh water per day, which meant Xin's daily water consumption required 20,000 tons of water. Based on statistics, 1% to 2% of the city's water supply was used for drinking. Therefore, it would require at least 200-400 tons of fresh water per day to maintain the drinking water demand of Xin residents.
Bathing could be saved, but drinking water couldn't be saved!
Fortunately, the Xin government had the money to sign a water supply contract with the Australian water company to supply 12,000 tons of fresh water per day to alleviate the domestic water supply pressure. But the high cost of transportation meant importing fresh water was not a long-term solution.
The Xin parliament voted to prepare a bid to build desalination equipment on Coro Island to curb the high water price.
Before the dissatisfaction of the people turned into protests.
Jiang Chen flipped through the documents, and Zhang Yaping continued.
"We plan to give you the desalination plant. If Future Group is not interested, we can think of another way. "
"Why don't you give it to the water plant?" Jiang Chen asked nonchalantly.
In Jiang Chen's memory, Australia's City-West-Wate, or CWW, was responsible for Pannu Island's fresh water supply and water pipeline maintenance. Jiang Chen had no interest in the fresh water market.
Even with the sky-high price of 5 USD per ton and monopolizing the entire Xin freshwater business, the desalination plant's monthly net profit was at most 500 thousand USD.
The annual profit was only 6 million. Compared to Future Group's profits in the internet, food, robot, automotive, and medical fields, it was not even a small profit.
"CWW believes our market is not enough to support a desalination plant and completely ignored our bid. Other small companies don't have the ability to accept the bid. If it doesn't work, the parliament is discussing the desalination project as a social welfare project, just like public schools, operated by the government. "Zhang Yaping forced a smile.
Continuing to subsidize fresh water would be too much even for the Xin government.
"What do you think?" Jiang Chen looked at Smith.
Smith smiled as he took the document from Jiang Chen's hand and flipped to the page with the picture.
"Based on the situation of Pannu Islands, our company recommends the integrated desalination plant using the LT-MED principle. The entire desalination line can process 35,000 tons per day with a processing cost of 1.6 USD per ton. It can perfectly solve the water supply crisis Xin is currently facing. "
"What's the price?"
"Including the construction of the treatment plant, our offer is 150 million USD."
"Too expensive." Zhang Yaping shook his head.
Even without considering the maintenance cost, the water treatment plant in an ideal situation would take 30 years to recover its investment. Although he did not lack money, there was no reason for Jiang Chen to accept a losing proposition.
Smith smiled helplessly.
"Desalination is a long term investment. Trust me, a one-time investment is definitely more cost-effective than importing fresh water in the long term. "
"Can't it be cheaper?"
"This is the market price." Smith used an uncompromising tone. "The desalination equipment Matrix designed for Maldives, Kuwait, and Saudi is much more expensive than what we sell to you."
To be honest, after negotiating for so many days, Smith was getting impatient.
The negotiation went on for so long, but there was no progress at all. The Xin government wanted to do desalination, but they didn't want to pay for it themselves. The largest water supplier, CWW, gave him the cold shoulder, making him feel like he was wasting his time.
The company urged him to solve the problem here as soon as possible and take his team to Saudi. There was also a 1 billion USD project with Saudi Desalination Corporation waiting for him.
Then, Jiang Chen suddenly spoke.
"Wait, you mean … the market price of desalination equipment is expensive?"
"What else? Do you think desalination is just a stove to boil water? I recommend you try it. "
Smith stood up, left a business card on the table, and looked at Zhang Yaping.
"I'm sorry, Mr. President, we couldn't come to an agreement, and my team and I have already wasted a week on the island. As for the geological assessment and the site selection of the water treatment plant, we can only calculate the cost separately. We will send the bill to the Presidential Palace in seven days. If you and your think tank have made a decision, please contact us at that time. I have another flight in two hours, see you. "
With that, Smith picked up his briefcase and left without looking back.
Zhang Yaping wanted to make him stay, but he was stopped by Jiang Chen.
"Let him go, I don't want to work with them." Jiang Chen laughed.
"Sigh, if it really doesn't work, we still have to pay the money. We can't keep importing water from abroad … Wait, what did you say? You want to get involved in the water business? "Zhang Yaping suddenly realized and looked at Jiang Chen with surprise.
If Future Group wanted to take over the project, he had nothing to worry about!
"I didn't plan to do that," Jiang Chen said without hesitation. Then he laughed, "But from what he said, the scale of the desalination market seems to be quite large."
What a miscalculation. Jiang Chen was so focused on Xin that he almost forgot that Xin was not the only country in the world that lacked water! Saudi, UAE, and other oil giants were all countries where water was more expensive than gold.
Let's not talk about the distant ones, let's talk about the recent ones. Why did Hua want to divert the water from south to north? It was because of the lack of water in the north! If they could build a dozen water treatment plants along the Bohai Sea coast, would the water from south to north still be needed?
Desalination was not a small profit, it was a huge profit! Was desalination a problem in the 22nd century? Reverse osmosis, low temperature multi-effect method, electrodialysis method were all too weak!
He almost didn't pick up the cash by his feet.
Thinking about this, Jiang Chen couldn't sit still anymore. He slapped his thigh and stood up.
[Sorry, Matrix Desalination Company, right? From now on, you have competitors!]
Seeing that Jiang Chen was about to leave, Zhang Yaping asked anxiously.
"Where are you going?"
He didn't stop Smith from leaving, and now that Jiang Chen was about to leave without saying a word, he was a bit anxious.
Someone had to solve the water problem!
Jiang Chen stopped, turned around, and smiled at him.
"I'm going to talk to CWW. I just remembered that Future Heavy Industrial can also provide desalination equipment. "
When he heard Jiang Chen's "also can", Zhang Yaping almost vomited blood as he cursed Jiang Chen in his mind.
[Fu * k! Why didn't you say so earlier!]
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