The worldwide lowest specific energy consumption measured in a seawater desalination plant – Real integration and opportunities of improvement

•Desalination plant with 2,500 m3/d and 1.794 kWh/m3 of specific energy consumption.•New concept of DESALRO 2.0® Guinness World Record (GWR) holder (February 2025).•Experimental assessment of an advanced SeaWater Reverse Osmosis (SWRO) demo plant.•Combining positive displacement pumps and high efficient energy recovery devices.•Optimisation of the SWRO rack coupling different models of membrane elements. This paper presents the most energy efficient 2,500 m 3 /d desalination plant using seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) technology, referred to as DESALRO 2.0®, which has achieved the Guinness World Record (GWR) with an Specific Energy Consumption (SEC) of 1.794 kWh/m 3 (February 2025) with 40% of recovery rate and an appropriate product water quality (TDS < 200 mg/L, B < 1 mg/L). It is located at ITC − DESAL+ LIVING LAB facilities in Pozo Izquierdo (− Canary Islands, Spain) – 37 g/L, 22°C, B < 1 mg/L −. The Canary Islands Institute of Technology (ITC) developed the design of the plant whereas the temporary joint venture Canaragua-Elmasa carried out the plant construction. The design has been scaled up to 5,000 m 3 /d. DESALRO 2.0® plant is based on an advanced SWRO rack implemented with commercial products. The system consists in feed water pressurisation by means of positive displacement high-pressure pumps (HPP) working in parallel, along with two isobaric chambers as energy recovery device (ERD) and a booster pump. Besides, an optimised design of the RO membranes inside the pressure vessels includes different models of membrane elements (hybrid internal design). Finally, the hydraulic design of the plant minimises the pressure losses.