“Saudi Arabia Leads Global Desalinated Water Production Surge” is the title of a June 12 post on Arab News, which reported “Saudi Arabia has achieved remarkable global leadership in doubling its desalinated water production, signaling its unwavering commitment to meeting daily water demands, stated Abdulrahman Al-Fadley, Saudi Minister of Environment, Water, and Agriculture,”
speaking at the Third High-Level International Conference on “Water for Sustainable Development 2018-2028” in Dushanbe, Tajikistan.
According to a German online data platform, Statista, the Kingdom produced 2.9 billion cubic meters of desalinated water in 2022, with the state-run Saline Water Conversion Corporation producing some 1.9 billion cubic meters; created in 1974, SWCC currently operates 30 desalination plants on the Red Sea and Persian Gulf alongside 139 purification stations. Saudi Arabia aims to fulfill 90% of its fresh water demand through desalinated water, with the remaining 10% supplied through ground and surface water, by 2030. Al-Fadley also emphasized significant advancements in wastewater treatment, and water reuse in agriculture and industry, reducing reliance on non-renewable groundwater.
In 2016, with its “Saudi Vision 2030” program, the Saudi Kingdom announced its commitment to create its own national economy, rather than remaining a mere exporter of fossil fuels, depending entirely on foreign exports to satisfy domestic needs.
To access water to grow at least a part of its own food, the Kingdom, early on, relied on deep wells of 1 to 2 km, pumping water from its huge, mainly nonrenewable reserves of underground fossil water aquifers. When intensive modern farming started, there was a staggering 500 cubic km of water beneath the Saudi desert, enough to fill Lake Erie. Close to 400 cubic km have been pumped to the surface for central pivot irrigation. Virtually none of it had been replaced by next to non-existent rainfall. Drip irrigation in farming and desalinated water, whose cost per liter dropped sharply, have remained part of the answer.
In August 2023, Saudi Arabia revealed its ambitious plan to deal with its growing water shortages, according to coverage in “Construction Week Middle East,” based on the “Seen” TV episode. The scope of the new plan goes far beyond anything done so far. According to popular Saudi journalist Ahmad Al Shugairi, in his TV series “Seen,” the ambitious feat will require the use of anti-corrosion pipes, each at 2.25 meters diameter, that would span 12,000 km in length, 11 meters in width, and 4 meters in depth—twice as long as the Nile River. The pipes running beneath Saudi cities will extend for 126,000 kilometers, long enough to circumscribe the globe three times, and the network will generate a massive amount of water, at 9.4 million cubic meters per day. Al Shugairi boasts that the amount of water, if distributed to the world’s 8 billion people, could offer each human two gallons of drinking water from Saudi Arabia every day.
In September 2023, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman announced the establishment of a “Global Water Organization” headquartered in Riyadh, to coordinate global efforts in ensuring water sustainability. At the Dushanbe conference, Al-Fadley confirmed the Kingdom’s commitment to enhance its global role in addressing sustainable development challenges, allocating funds exceeding $6 billion to several countries in the world..
