UP TO $70 million in government funding will be sought on joint projects between National University of Singapore (NUS) and water technology developer GE Water for a new research centre.

The new $150 million NUS-GE Singapore Water Technology Centre, which will be officially opened next week, will look into developing safe drinking water systems.

Targetted areas of research include low energy desalination, and exploring solar energy and other alternative energy sources to power clean water purification technology.

Professor Barry Halliwell, NUS Deputy President of Research and Technology, shared this on the sidelines of a media tour of the new centre on Thursday.

The 2,700 sq m facility, spread across two locations at the university's engineering faculty, will initially house 37 scientists and engineers. This will eventually be expanded to accomodate 100 staff.

Researchers will focus on developing solutions for improved low-energy seawater desalination systems and more efficient water reuse and reclaimation methods, for example. This will include working on membrane based processes such as reverse osmosis, ultrafiltration and electrodialysis.

For example, researchers will explore how membranes can be made to filter more contaminants, while making them last longer, said GE's general manager for the Asia-Pacific Region, Mr Kevin Cassidy. 'Research is targetted at improving efficiency, and how we can extract more pure water with the same effort.'

The centre represents the water technology developer's first collaboration with a university in the Asia-Pacific region.

Professor Michael Saunders, Director of the NUS Environmental Research Institute, said: 'Having an industry university partnership is critical for successful universities in the next decade or two. This allows the university to do more, while enabling students coming here who want to work on such research to get closer to the real world.'

The technology developed at the centre also has 'exceptional' market potential regionally, Prof Saunders added.