By Yael Ben-David ~
Where deserts previously towered as a threat for dry climates and unpredictable rains, Israel has turned the dictum on its head: it has fashioned scarcity into means to irrigate surfeit. Through advancements in water desalination, water-conserving irrigation, and green recycling, Israel has turned its natural limitations the water-saving model for the world.
What was needed became a clarion call to the nation—a culture of innovation that pinches pennies on every ounce.
A Thirst for Innovation
Since Israel’s inception, all the way back to 1948 when it was founded, its survival had been doubtful at least partly because it was entirely open to aridity. It’s largely a half-arid country, and the Sea of Galilee and some hidden fresh-water aquifers were too limited to maintain its citizens, not to mention agriculture.
Flash forward to the future, and Israel gets more than 80% of its municipal water supply from desalination plants—a spinoff from high-tech and innovative public expenditure. On the west side of Tel Aviv rises the Sorek Desalination Plant, a giant of the world’s biggest and most efficient desalination plants, disgorging 624,000 cubic meters of water per day. Equipped with reverse osmosis and energy-recovery technology, Sorek is leading the charge for low-cost, giant solutions for water-short countries.
Desalination is only part of the solution.
Drip by Drip: How Drip Irrigation Changed Agriculture
It was in the 1960s that Israeli engineer Simcha Blass and Kibbutz Hatzerim collaborated to work on a groundbreaking concept: drip irrigation. It is an irrigation method by which water drips over plant roots through a network of exceedingly fine tubes and emitters without evaporation and wasting fewer waters.
Drip irrigation is now in more than 100 countries and revolutionizing farming in dry and semi-dry regions. Global market leader Israeli company Netafim stays one step ahead with “smart irrigation” technology in the shape of sensors, real-time information, and artificial intelligence-based energy, conserving water and increasing yields.
“Drip irrigation wasn’t a technological revolution—it was a paradigm revolution,” opines Dr. Shira Erez.
Reycling the Unthinkable
Israel is also world-leading in recycling wastewater. A whopping nearly 90% of Israel’s wastewater is recycled and treated, and largely for farming. Spain is a distant second at just 30%.
Shafdan Wastewater Treatment Plant in the city of Tel Aviv processes over 130 million cubic meters of water every year. Over 60% of Israeli agriculture is irrigated—vineyards through citrus groves use treated water. Israel’s approach was a world’s best practice in the opinion of the World Bank.
Policy and Culture: The Unsung Heroes
Behind the technological and hardware success there is a sound foundation of national policy, cultural determination, and education. Israel has had a national water authority that has regulated all elements of water conservation, price, and allocation since the 1950s.
Water education begins in Israeli schools, where children learn to save, learn to conserve during dry years, and learn water cycles as kids. Low-flow appliances, leak-detection schemes, and public education programs teach incentives for sealing national awareness and action gaps.
“Water isn’t a resource—it’s a responsibility,” says Avi Levi, Israel’s national water carrier, Mekorot spokesman. “That philosophy underlies everything we do.”
Shaking the World into Action
And though global warming and skewed weather patterns have extended the reach of drought, governments everywhere are looking to Israel to reverse the trend. Officials from President Barack Obama’s administration in California state, India, and African nations have toured Israel to examine the Israeli water system firsthand, and multibillion-dollar deals are being negotiated to sell Israeli technology overseas.
The best example of the same is the Abraham Accords-facilitated recent water agreement between Israel, Jordan, and the United Arab Emirates to exchange solar electricity for desalinated water—a Middle Eastern hope beacon of cooperation born out of desperation and ingenuity.
From flower in flower garden to desert bloom, the Israeli water epic is one of vision and energy. And as danger of climatic disaster casts its shadow ever broader and broader over the globe, the Israeli story is beacon, not source of hope.
