Abstract
Although groundwater is an alternative to human supply, it often presents itself unfit for consumption due to the high indices of dissolved salts. Thus, water treatment by reverse osmosis appears as an alternative to obtaining drinking water. The objective of this study was to evaluate the environmental, economic and social sustainability of the process of desalination of groundwater in the Caatinga Grande community in São José do Seridó/RN. A community study was carried out with technical visits to seize data on the system, to verify the environmental perception of the residents and to carry out collections of the main sources of water available in the community water treatment system. By means of the results it was found that the system is socially sustainable, since it favored the coexistence of the population with the local reality.. The economic and environmental sustainability, despite the high costs of maintaining and producing tailings, demands interventions of the order of public policies and advanced research to benefit the community in order to make the system self-sustaining.. It is concluded that, for the development of rural communities, the groundwater desalinization system is a viable strategy when employing post-treatment techniques and financial resources in a sustainable manner.
Keywords:
Sustainability; semiarid; desalination; community