In June 2017, Water. Desalination + reuse (Faversham House) reported that Formosa Petrochemical Corporation (FPCC) had hired IDE Technologies for a 105,000 m³/day seawater reverse osmosis plant at the Mai-Liao power station in Yunlin County. The water was intended for the refinery on site. IDE's scope covered design, equipment supply, installation, commissioning and two years of operation and maintenance. The specification demanded boron below 0.01 ppm. The project followed a government decision to cut FPCC's water rights in favour of local farming.
The report showed tighter water allocations pushing industrial users toward seawater desalination, and how demanding process water specifications such as boron limits could become.