The Newsletter of          The Middle East Desalination Research Center		Issue 19 February 2003

The Palestinian Water Authority and Its Desalination Activities

By Dr. Nahed Ghbn

PWA Chairman Assistant

Over the past 30 years the water situation in the Palestinian territories has increasingly deteriorated and suffered from environmental pollution, water shortage and lack of infrastructure and management

The Palestinian Water Authority (PWA) has been established under the presidential resolution No. 90 of 1995, to be as central and autonomous authority, acting under the direct responsibility of the President of the Palestinian National Authority. PWA is the regulatory body for Palestinian water resource management and development with its main goal being to ensure the equitable utilization and sustainable management and development of Palestinian water resources.

The main challenge to secure sustainable management of water resources includes finding additional non-conventional water resources such as desalination and wastewater reuse coupled with programs to enhance capacity building and human resources development.

The Palestinian Water Authority has prepared the National Water Plan which defines a huge investment program of Projects needed for water sector development over the next 20 years. This investment program reaches about 1.5 Billion USD in the Gaza strip and about 3.5 Billion USD in the West Bank. This covers seven main water categories: water supply, wastewater, Storm water, water resources, water conservation, agriculture and capacity building.

Fig 1. The Investment Plan in the Gaza strip (2000-2020)

Fig 2. The Investment Plan in the West Bank (2000-2020)

To proceed in implementation of this ambitious plan, the PWA has adopted process of enhanced comprehensive cooperation and coordination with all concerned parties locally, regionally and internationally as well as the bilateral agreements for project financing and co-financing, including adaptation the water reforms in the Palestinian territories by creating one water utility in the Gaza strip and three water utilities in the West Bank. To sustain the infrastructure for operational management included under the NWP, the PWA is focusing also on the human development and capacity building issues.

1. Small Scale Desalination Plants

Presently the PWA is in process to finalize the first construction phases of two small seawater desalination plants in the Gaza strip (Northern & Middle) to provide the Palestinian communities with good quality water for drinking purposes as an emergency solution to alleviate the unsafe supplied domestic water with very high chloride and nitrate concentration. These plants will produce water with drinking water quality standards. The sources of feed water will be beach wells located close to the sea shore. The treatment process consists of pretreatment (chlorination, coagulation, PH adjustment, sand filtration, safety cartridge filtration, dechlorination), RO process, post treatment and sterilization.

The Northern one is financed through a grant from the French Government which, covers the first phase with capacity of 1250 m3 / day located at the north of Gaza Strip with a grant value of 21 MFRF(3.0MUSD). The civil works will be ready to accommodate an extension up to capacity of 5000 m3 / day.

The Middle one is financed through a grant from the Austrian Government to cover a first phase of capacity of 600 m3 / day located at the middle area of Gaza Strip with a grant value of 44 MAST(3.3MUSD).  The civil works will be ready to accommodate an extension up to capacity of 2400 m3 / day

In parallel to implementation of these treatment plants a study has been conducted by PWA through French consultant to evaluate the distribution options of desalinated water for drinking proposes. As a result  the water will be distributed to customers by limited separate distribution network to high density population, Distribution by tankers and Filling stations (water shops).

Large Scale Sea Water Desalination Plants

To improve the domestic municipal water supply system in the Gaza strip an integration aquifer management plan has been developed through USAID assistance (CAMP program).

It has been defined that projected water demand in the Gaza strip will be dramatically increased from about 150 mcm in the year 2000 to reach about 260 mcm in the year 2020, of which about 180 mcm for municipal purposes. According to the integrated aquifer management plan a serious increasingly groundwater deterioration and big water deficit in Gaza regarding quality and quantity will take place if no action is taken. In order to alleviate this problem and to fulfill the domestic (municipal) water demand it has been adopted the RO sea water desalination as the most realistic option for Gaza conditions only.

Following this concept sea water desalination master plan has been produced and finally reached an agreement with USAID to finance a design build contract for implementation of the  first phase of the huge RO seawater desalination plant as full donation with capacity of 60,000 m3 per day (16 Mgal/day) and the Gaza regional North-South water carrier to distribute the good water overall Gaza strip. This desalination plant will be capable to be extended to reach in the final phase the capacity of 150,000 m3 per day in year 2020. The quality of the produced water will match with domestic WHO and Palestinian standards. The desalination project includes sea intake, outfall, two pumping stations, storage, and 2 km pipeline to Regional Carrier.  Some of this infrastructure will be built at the eventual capacity of 150,000 m3/day

It is expected that Gaza’s huge desalination and carrier projects will contribute very much in improving the water quality supplied to the citizens and will alleviate the increasing water crisis and water deficit in the Gaza ground water aquifer, while additionally providing larger quantities of good quality water to cover the increasing annual water demand of the Gaza population and different sectors in the Gaza strip.

Human Development in The Palestinian Territories

Human resources is one of the most important topics for water sector development not only in the Palestinian territories but also in the whole region. In this context the PWA has developed a model for human resource development to be presented and discussed during the 3rd World Water Forum to be held in Japan (Koyoto). This model depends mainly on the elaboration between the main elements of human resource development such as technical training, leadership management, administrative management, public participation and involvement, high educational programs and financial sustainability

This model will be very useful in our plans to sustain, operate and maintain the huge infrastructure to be implemented in the Gaza strip and the West Bank.