Jordan and Israel are moving forward with the first phase of their ambitious Red-to-Dead Sea project to build jointly new pilot-scale facilities to boost the water supply to both countries and replenish the severely depleted Dead Sea, which borders both nations. The countries reached an agreement on the project, sponsored by the World Bank, last February.
Israel’s Interior Ministry, Jordan’s Ministry of Water and Irrigation and the Jordan Valley Authority issued on Dec. 1 an international build-operate-transfer tender to prequalify firms to build a desalination plant in Aqaba, Jordan, a water pipeline to the Dead Sea and a possible hydroelectric powerplant.
Bids for the estimated $800-million to $900-million project are due by March 30. “There are a lot of Israeli and foreign companies interested in the project as it is one of the largest desalination projects in the planning stages,” says Avraham Tenne, former desalination director at Israel’s Water Authority.