Israel’s Water Crisis Returns With A Vengeance

Finally more than 70 Palestinians were arrested and charged with illegally entering Israel, trespassing, causing malicious damage, and carrying out theft under aggravated circumstances.

But the damage had been done.

TODAY’S BLOG

Israel’s Water Crisis Returns With A Vengeance

The Kineret is at its lowest point ever. Beset by massive outflows to farmers in Jordan and Israel, the lake is receding and islands have appeared in the middle (photo Haaretz).

It seems an odd item to be writing about here in Ashdod this morning as a heavy rain is currently hitting the area. But the unfortunate fact is that after four years of  apparent water abundance and touting itself as a world leader in water technology, Israel is on the precipice of water rationing again.

This despite the fact that some 80% of Israel’s drinking water is being produced by desalination and almost 90% of its waste water is being reclaimed for use in agriculture and landscaping.

How did we get to this point again?

1. The last four years have seen another record drought during which time the government rested on its laurels and failed to see that another crisis might be on the horizon.

2. Israel’s population has been rapidly increasing.

3. There has been an unprecedented depletion of Israel’s water reserves, primarily by Israeli farmers. Part of the farming problem is that Israeli farmers are growing large amounts of water consumptive crops such as cotton and corn.

A cotton field in the Yizrael Valley. Typically, it takes 20,000 liters of water to produce 1 kg of cotton.

In your humble servant’s opinion, point 3 is the major problem. Consider these facts:

*The area of irrigated farmland has grown from 74,000 acres in 1948 to almost 500,000 acres today.

*About 80% of Israel’s freshwater sources are used by farmers.

These facts stand in opposition to the fact that agricultural production as a percentage of GDP has dropped from 6% in 1979 to less than 2.5% today.

So what is the solution?

To begin with, water reclamation cannot be increased past 90% because the remaining 10% is solid waste.

Obviously the water allocation to farmers needs to be cut, but plans to do so by 50% in the coming year were met with an immediate outcry from farmers. The plans were quickly dropped.

Another solution is to build more desalination plants. At a cost of almost $400,000 million per plant, this is pricey and will take years to implement.

A third solution would be to build several new reservoirs to catch winter rainwater. The cost would be about $60 million, but this solution is shortsighted at best. Collecting rainwater in reservoirs would only further deplete Israel’s underground aquifers.

The fourth solution is the one most likely to be implemented first; there must be a decrease, once again, in personal water consumption. No watering of lawns, no building of personal swimming pools, no more long showers, no personal washing of cars, etc.–in short, the return of water rationing is at hand.

And so it goes this morning in Israel.