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Ed Webb

Canal (Kanal) Istanbul May Displace Thousands, Impact Ocean and Water Quality - 0 views

news.nationalgeographic.com/...bosporus-environmental-impacts

Turkey Istanbul development infrastructure AKP Erdogan environment sustainability water

shared by Ed Webb on 04 Apr 18 - No Cached
  • “Whoever cuts a branch from my forest, I will cut his head,” Sultan Mehmed II, who led the Ottomans into Istanbul, is said to have ordered in the 1400s. Today, thousands of trucks carrying soil and construction materials kick up dust along the roads north of Istanbul, depleting those forests that had been protected by sultans for five centuries.
  • Canal Istanbul (also called Istanbul Kanal), a massive shipping canal meant to route traffic from the Bosporus some 18 miles (30 kilometers) to the east. The homes alongside the new seaway will be replaced with upscale residential and commercial areas. With construction set to start there any day now, real estate speculators descend on the area, clamoring for locals to sell them their land
  • When completed, the canal will turn the densest part of the city, including its historic center, into an island. The area also straddles one of the world’s most active fault lines.
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  • The Bosporus is currently one of the most crowded waterways in the world. Thousands of oil tankers make up part of the 53,000 civilian and military vessels that transited through the Bosporus in 2017, compared to around 12,000 ships that transited the Panama Canal, and 17,000 the Suez Canal.
  • At the Black Sea, the canal will link with a new, 10 billion euro airport set to open this year that will feature the largest indoor terminal in the world. It will handle 200 million passengers annually, along with an air cargo hub that Turkey hopes will draw traffic from current European airports. A new highway cutting through forest on the Black Sea coast will feed the airport and canal, bringing cargo from Europe to the west and Asia to the east.
  • many of the region’s environmental experts say the government has not consulted them. Some of these experts have grown critical of the massive projects, saying they could have serious ecological consequences and imperil an already tenuous water supply
  • A square meter of land around Şamlar that went for $6.5 three years ago now sells for up to $184
  • “We are going to have new hospitals, parks, marinas, luxury apartments, and a city on both sides of the beautiful canal that will look like New York or Paris,”
  • Around 2 million people are employed in construction in Turkey, which accounts for about 19 percent of the country’s annual economic growth. Turkish construction firms rank as the second most active in terms of overseas operations, after Chinese firms. To reach its economic goals for 2023, the government has said it will need to invest about $700 billion in new infrastructure, plus $400 billion in urban renewal projects
  • Turkish officials have said the new canal will be able to handle all the traffic currently in the Bosporus, hinting that although they would like all current traffic to use the new route, the internationally protected Bosporus could also remain open, so the 1936 treaty is not technically violated. “The Montreux Convention regulates access to the Bosporus. However, the regulations for the Bosporus and the canal our country plans to build to offer an alternative route are different,” Minister Arslan said in January.
  • Residents in the area challenged the projects in 2013, filing lawsuits claiming the expropriation of their land was too hasty, and the government was paying them a fraction of the true value of the land. Based on the government’s own environmental impact report, nearly 100 other villagers then filed additional cases challenging the projects. Although a court ordered construction to be halted, the government issued a revised report in 2014. At that time they resumed construction.
  • The canal, airport, and highway projects directly contravene the city’s master plan, opponents charge.
  • many of the city planners and environmental experts Turkey once asked for advice on such mega projects now say they are being ignored. Many of these professionals say they are no longer seen as advisors, but political opposition to the ruling Justice and Development Party
  • “The 2009 plan was trying to at least set an aim for the population of Istanbul, capping it at 16 million,” says Atlar. “The conclusion was that there should be no more settlements in the northern forest, and that water and culturally important land must be protected. Further development would be east and west, not north.”
  • In 2012, Turkey’s federal government passed new legislation that would make it easier to reclassify any reserved land. Areas can be expropriated if they are deemed an earthquake risk, if they are needed to house people in the case of an earthquake, or if their development is considered in the national interest.
  • Of the 7,650-hectare land for the airport, which will include residential and commercial developments, 80 percent is now composed of forests and 9 percent lakes and ponds. Canal Istanbul will result in the leveling of 350 hectares of forest and run through districts that are home to more than one million people.
  • there is an open question of whether or not such a canal would violate the Montreux Convention, a 1936 treaty that ensures the free passage of commercial vessels and naval ships of countries along the Black Sea, including Russia, through the Bosporus, except in times of war
  • With Istanbul’s population growing at a breakneck pace—from 3 million in 1980 to 15 million today—the city plan was meant to ensure resources like water and housing would be able to meet demand
  • city’s water supply in danger.
  • In the 17th century, Mimar Sinan, the same Ottoman architect famed for the Blue Mosque, oversaw the construction of hundreds of miles of new aqueducts, several dams, and water basins that fed into hundreds of fountains in the city. Most of that ancient water system relied on streams and rivers in catchment areas in the forests north of the city—the same forests where the new airport is currently being built.
  • around 40 percent of Istanbul’s water comes from the European side of the city, which, even according to the government’s own environmental assessments, will be severely impacted by the canal and airport. The Sazlıdere Dam will be entirely uprooted, and smaller streams and underground water tables that feed at least three other lakes in the area could end up being disrupted. A drought in 2008 depleted the capacity of the city’s water reservoirs to 25 percent, and another in 2014 to 29 percent. Even in more wet years, Istanbul residents deal with water cuts that can last days
  • The Marmara Sea, part of the Mediterranean, is far more salty than the Black Sea, which leads to a powerful flow of water as the two bodies naturally try to reach a state of equilibrium. That flow was put to use by engineers in the 1990s, part of a $600 million World Bank project to provide a sustainable water system for Istanbul.
  • a series of 67 waste treatment plants were built. The city estimates 97 percent of its waste is now treated. The effluent, including any waste that still remains, is dumped into a point where the Bosporus meets the Marmara Sea. There, it is carried by an undercurrent north to the Black Sea.
  • with the Canal Istanbul project, Saydam and other experts warn that system could be turned on its head, upending the delicate balance of life in the water. If the canal is built, Saydam says, it will provide an alternate route connecting the Black and Marmara Seas. Years of modeling and scientific studies suggest that could undo the unique waste water system in Istanbul, he says. The change in the salinity could also spark an anoxic state in the waters, one that would end up leaving the city smelling of hydrogen sulfide
  • once you do this there will be no way to turn back
Ed Webb

Ahead of COP27, Egypt is highly vulnerable to climate change - 0 views

qz.com/-for-climate-change-1849657612

Egypt water agriculture food land climate COP sustainability SDGs

shared by Ed Webb on 27 Oct 22 - Cached
  • Adel Abdullah cultivates a subsistence living off of six acres of peppers, eggplants, cucumbers, tomatoes, wheat, corn, and pomegranates. He is one of millions of smallholder farmers working in the Delta. He walks barefoot in his farm as a show of reverence to the land. The soil is pale and thin, almost as sandy as the beach, and choked by mounting concentrations of salt, left behind by periodic coastal flooding and pushed into underground aquifers by the rising sea.“This is the first place to be affected by climate change,” Abdullah says. “The barriers help a bit with flooding, but the salty soil is still really killing us.”
  • he takes irrigation water from the nearby Kitchener Drain, one of the largest and most polluted canals in Egypt that aggregates wastewater from the farms, businesses, and households of an estimated 11 million people in the Delta. By the time water reaches Abdullah’s farm, it may have been reused half a dozen times since entering Egypt in the Nile, each time accumulating more salts and pollutants and losing beneficial nutrients.
  • Abdullah is forced to douse the farm in fertilizers, pesticides, and salt-suppressing chemicals, all of which further degrade the soil. Those inputs, on top of the rising costs of irrigation systems and machinery, eat up any potential income Abdullah might earn
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  • The Nile Delta—where agriculture employs one-fifth of the country’s workforce and is responsible for 12% of its GDP and much of its food supply—is being hammered by rising sea levels, rising temperatures, and a growing shortage of water.
  • rapid urbanization and population growth
  • Climate adaptation solutions that could keep environmental problems from turning existential—fixing the battered and wasteful irrigation network, expanding affordable access to improved seeds and climate-smart farming technologies, and more effective and equitable regulation of urban development on agricultural land—are being rolled out by the government and research groups, but often slower than the pace of climate impacts. That’s left Egypt’s economy and food security exposed to growing risk.
  • “We’re really squeezed and marginalized here, and the government isn’t helping,” said one farmer down the road from Abdullah, who requested anonymity to speak frankly (with tens of thousands of political prisoners, Egypt’s restrictions on free speech are also gaining prominence ahead of COP27).
  • his children see no future in agriculture
  • Around 1805, an Ottoman general named Muhammad Ali took control of the country, and founded the dynasty of kings that would rule—eventually under British colonial supervision—for 150 years. One of Ali’s most enduring marks on the country was the establishment of the first modern network of dams and irrigation canals in the Delta, which allowed tens of thousands of new acres to come under cultivation.
  • water and land played a crucial role in Nasser’s legacy. 12% of the country’s arable land was owned by the aristocracy; Nasser nationalized this land and distributed it to about 340,000 impoverished rural families. He also further extended Ali’s irrigation network and oversaw construction of the Aswan High Dam, which brought an end to the Nile’s ancient seasonal flooding and fixed the river in its present position, with just two remaining branches forking through the Delta.
  • Egypt’s population has since more than quadrupled, to 104 million. Yet the flow of the Nile, which supplies more than 95% of the country’s water, has remained more or less constant. In the 1990s water availability fell below the international “water poverty” benchmark of 1,000 cubic meters per person per year.
  • Egypt has managed that scarcity by meticulously recycling agricultural water and, in recent years, curtailing the production of water-intensive crops like cotton and rice and importing 40% of its wheat and other food staples.
  • The population is still growing quickly, and could reach 160 million by 2050. The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam that is nearing completion upstream could cut the flow of Nile water into Egypt by a quarter during the as-yet-unknown number of years it will take to fill its reservoir. By 2100, climate change-related heat waves upstream could reduce the Nile’s flow by 75%, Abousabaa said.
  • rising temperatures and falling rainfall mean crops—which consume 86% of Egypt’s water supply—will require more irrigation to survive.
  • current annual demand for water is about 35% higher than what the country receives from the Nile, groundwater, and a very small amount of rain—a deficit of about 20 billion cubic meters. To cover it, she said, Egypt will need to use every drop multiple times, aggressively minimize wastage, and boost the supply by investing $2.8 billion in dozens of new desalination plants with the aim to produce 5 billion cubic meters annually by 2050.
  • On the western fringe of the Delta, farms and suburbs are gradually overtaking the desert as the central Delta grows more crowded. Here, water is even scarcer and the impacts of climate change are more pronounced. But in this and a few other desert areas around Egypt, the government is working to link more than 1.5 million acres to groundwater irrigation, and says it is about one-third of the way there. Land reclamation could take some pressure off the Delta, and sandy soils are well-suited for the production of citrus fruits that are one of Egypt’s most lucrative exports.
  • The unpredictability makes it difficult to identify solutions, Salah says: “Climate change is like a big black box.”
  • “For the last two years, with heat wave after heat wave, we lost more than half the crop. It’s really sad.”
  • The farm relies on groundwater brought up from wells on the property, and Nasrallah says the suburbs are draining the aquifer. In the last four years he has had to dig an extra thirty meters to find water—and deeper wells mean higher electricity bills for pumping. Some wells have dried up altogether. Recently, government officials told him he had to stop watering the grass on a soccer field he built for his workers.
  • Urbanization is also spreading in the inner Delta, as many farmers decide that constructing housing is more profitable than growing crops. Since the 1970s, about 14% of the Delta’s arable land has been converted to urban development
  • Individual farms are also becoming smaller with each generation as, in keeping with longstanding Egyptian custom, land is divided among a father’s heirs (with sons traditionally taking a larger share than daughters). Urban development degrades the Delta’s soil and drives more farming into the desert, leaving the entire food system more vulnerable to climate impacts. Land fragmentation leads to the inefficient use of water and other resources and raises the costs of distribution for farmers.
  • in some cases, the government’s own plans are responsible, most recently in August when thousands of people living on a Nile island near Cairo that was primarily used for farming were evicted to make way for a state-sanctioned development project.
  • The network started by Muhammed Ali now includes about 33,000 miles of delivery and drainage canals across the country, enough to wrap around the globe, that range in size from small rivers to something a child could hop over. Delta residents say they used to bathe in these canals, drink from them, and raise fish in them. Now many of them, especially at the ends of the network, are polluted with farming chemicals and sewage, and choked with trash.
  • Between seepage, evaporation, and water wasted by farmers who flood their fields instead of using controlled irrigation hoses, nearly one-third of the country’s water is lost in the irrigation system between the Aswan High Dam and the sea
  • The soil is dark and appears rich, but is crusted with a visible layer of salt, a problem that affects up to 40% of Egypt’s arable soil.
  • Fixing the irrigation network is a priority for the government. Eman Sayed from the Irrigation Ministry said her agency has lined about 3,700 miles of canals with concrete in the last two years and is aiming to finish another 12,400 in the next few years. The ministry is also helping farmers cover the cost of installing drip irrigation systems, which researchers at AUC found can cut farmers’ water consumption 61% per year; today such systems cover only one-sixth of arable land in Egypt.
  • Authorities have also begun to restrict production of water-intensive crops like rice and bananas, although farmers say there is little enforcement of these rules, and both crops are still widely cultivated throughout the Delta.
  • Egypt has made clear that COP27 will focus primarily on wringing climate finance out of the rich countries that are most responsible for climate change.
  • On the horizon, an offshore natural gas platform is visible. Egypt, which seized the disruption of Russian energy supplies to Europe because of the Ukraine war as an opening to boost its own exports of natural gas, is now contributing more to the problem than ever before; an independent review of its new climate strategy ranked it “highly insufficient” for averting disastrous levels of carbon emissions.
  • By 2100, Noureldeen says, sea level rise could inundate nearly 700 square miles of the coastal Delta and displace four million people.
Ed Webb

See where water is scarcest in the world - and why we need to conserve - Washington Post - 1 views

www.washingtonpost.com/...water-scarcity-map-solutions

water climate development economy SDGs agriculture

shared by Ed Webb on 16 Aug 23 - No Cached
  • An analysis of newly released data from the World Resources Institute (WRI) shows that by 2050 an additional billion people will be living in arid areas and regions with high water stress, where at least 40 percent of the renewable water supply is consumed each year. Two-fifths of the world’s population — 3.3 billion people in total — currently live in such areas.
  • the Middle East and North Africa regions have the highest level of water stress in the world. Climate change is shifting traditional precipitation patterns, making the regions drier and reducing their already scarce water supplies. Population growth and industrial use of water are expected to increase demand.
  • The WRI analysis accounts for surface water, but not groundwater stores that are tapped when lakes, rivers and reservoirs run dry. This means the new estimates may underestimate risk. Many rural areas use groundwater for drinking water and farmers worldwide rely on it for irrigation. But groundwater often replenishes much more slowly than surface water.
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  • Only half of 1 percent of the world’s water supply is fresh water in liquid form. The rest is saltwater or frozen into glaciers.
  • its biggest use, globally, is for food production
  • “It’s much more useful and easier to live with if the water all comes regularly and without these extremes. But more and more, that’s not the case.”
  • If surface water is in short supply, people often turn to groundwater, which can be rapidly depleted. In India, nearly 60 percent of the population makes a living from farming. For decades, the government supported farmers by subsidizing the cost of diesel to run water pumps and tractors and by purchasing wheat and rice at an artificially high price. Water demand to irrigate rice and wheat fields is contributing to groundwater depletion in the northern region of Punjab.
  • “More people demand more water, but also each person demands more water as they get wealthier,” Iceland said. “So as you get wealthier, you move from a more grain and vegetable-oriented diet to a more meat-oriented diet.”
  • Growing and feeding a cow to create one pound of beef requires as much as 1,800 gallons of water, by some estimates. Calorie-for-calorie, that’s almost eight times as much water as vegetables and 20 times as much water as cereals like wheat and corn.
  • Water-intensive crops like sugar cane and cotton could also drive demand in sub-Saharan Africa, where water use is expected to double over the next 20 years. Many areas still lack infrastructure to reliably deliver water for irrigation. As those pipelines are built, more farmers will have access to water, which will further strain surface water supplies. Inefficient water use and unsustainable management could lower gross domestic product in the region by 6 percent, according to WRI.
  • One Saudi company is growing alfalfa in the Arizona desert, pulling from the area’s groundwater supplies. That alfalfa is then shipped overseas to feed cattle in Saudi Arabia, where industrial-scale farming of forage crops has been banned to conserve the nation’s water.
  • Water is also integral to mining lithium and other minerals used in electric vehicle batteries and renewable energy infrastructure. These critical minerals are often found in arid places like Chile, which is already water-stressed and is projected to use 20 percent more water by 2050, according to WRI.
  • Since farming accounts for the most water use globally, experts say that micro-sprinklers and drip irrigation instead of flood irrigation are an important solution.
  • reducing meat and dairy consumption can decrease individual water footprints. Reducing food waste could also help reduce water use. In the United States, more than a third of food ends up in the landfill. The biggest single contributor to food waste is throwing away food at home.
Ed Webb

Syria Comment » Archives » "Bush White House Wanted to Destroy the Syrian Sta... - 0 views

www.joshualandis.com/blog

US USA Cheney Blair Syria Lebanon Iraq analysis

shared by Ed Webb on 05 Sep 10 - Cached
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Ed Webb

The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer: Turning Qatar into an Island: Saudi cuts off... - 0 views

mideastsoccer.blogspot.sg/...ar-into-island-saudi-cuts.html

KSA Saudi Qatar GCC religion politics media territory

shared by Ed Webb on 13 Apr 18 - No Cached
  • There’s a cutting-off-the-nose-to-spite-the face aspect to a Saudi plan to turn Qatar into an island by digging a 60-kilometre ocean channel through the two countries’ land border that would accommodate a nuclear waste heap as well as a military base. If implemented, the channel would signal the kingdom’s belief that relations between the world’s only two Wahhabi states will not any time soon return to the projection of Gulf brotherhood that was the dominant theme prior to the United Arab Emirates-Saudi-led imposition in June of last year of a diplomatic and economic boycott of Qatar.
  • The message that notions of Gulf brotherhood are shallow at best is one that will be heard not only in Doha, but also in other capitals in the region
  • the nuclear waste dump and military base would be on the side of the channel that touches the Qatari border and would effectively constitute a Saudi outpost on the newly created island.
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  • The plan, to be funded by private Saudi and Emirati investors and executed by Egyptian firms that helped broaden the Suez Canal, also envisions the construction of five hotels, two ports and a free trade zone.
  • The $750 million project would have the dump ready for when Saudi Arabia inaugurates the first two of its 16 planned nuclear reactors in 2027. Saudi Arabia is reviewing proposals to build the reactors from US, Chinese, French, South Korean contractors and expects to award the projects in December.
  • Qatar’s more liberal Wahhabism of the sea contrasts starkly with the Wahhabism of the land that Prince Mohammed is seeking to reform. The crown prince made waves last year by lifting a ban on women’s driving, granting women the right to attend male sporting events in stadiums, and introducing modern forms of entertainment like, music, cinema and theatre – all long-standing fixtures of Qatari social life and of the ability to reform while maintaining autocratic rule.
  • A traditional Gulf state and a Wahhabi state to boot, Qatari conservatism was everything but a mirror image of Saudi Arabia’s long-standing puritan way of life. Qatar did not have a powerful religious establishment like the one in Saudi Arabia that Prince Mohammed has recently whipped into subservience, nor did it implement absolute gender segregation. Non-Muslims can practice their faith in their own houses of worship and were exempted from bans on alcohol and pork. Qatar became a sponsor of the arts and hosted the controversial state-owned Al Jazeera television network that revolutionized the region’s controlled media landscape and became one of the world’s foremost global English-language broadcasters.
  • Qatari conservatism is likely what Prince Mohammed would like to achieve even if that is something he is unlikely to acknowledge
  • “I consider myself a good Wahhabi and can still be modern, understanding Islam in an open way. We take into account the changes in the world,” Abdelhameed Al Ansari, the then dean of Qatar University’s College of Sharia, a leader of the paradigm shift, told The Wall Street Journal in 2002.
  • if built, the channel would suggest that geopolitical supremacy has replaced ultra-conservative, supremacist religious doctrine as a driver of the king-in-waiting’s policy
Ed Webb

MERIP Water in the middle East 2020 - 1 views

MENA water agriculture food security WaterSecurity climate analysis economy

shared by Ed Webb on 25 Feb 21 - No Cached
  • As a result of these climatic conditions, there is little surface water. The lines of rivers threading across the map of the region are few and far between. The arid climate also means that where there are stores of water below the surface, those aquifers are not being replenished very quickly. In some cases, aquifers are not being replenished at all; these fossil aquifers date back hundreds of thousands of years to past epochs when the region’s climate was wetter.
  • When it comes to water, the Middle East is a region of superlatives: the highest proportion of a population exposed to water stress, the least sustainable water resource use, the most water scarce region in the world. This simplistic narrative contains some truth.
  • The Middle East and North Africa also contains mountain chains where vegetation is lush and winters wet. Morocco’s Rif mountains, for example, receive over a meter of rainfall a year (for comparison, that is more than the Adirondacks). Around the Mediterranean Sea, too, climates are milder and rainfall higher. It sometimes snows in Damascus. Furthermore, even some dry parts of the region have significant water resources flowing through them, originating in wetter climes. Egypt’s southern city of Aswan, for instance, only receives 1mm of rainfall a year, but sits on the banks of the Nile, the longest river in the world. Depictions of the Middle East as water scarce, therefore, must be nuanced by an appreciation of the region’s varied geographies.
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  • The particularly high growth rates in some countries—Iraq, Bahrain and Palestine—are not matched in all countries
  • Migration and forced displacement also shape population distributions.
  • The broad characterization of the region as water scarce and people rich, on the other hand, tells a simple and powerful story. It is a story that is reinforced by a commonly used indicator, the Falkenmark Water Stress Index. This easily calculable figure is a ratio of the total renewable freshwater resources available in a country to the number of people. If the index is less than 1,000 cubic meters per capita per year, it denotes a situation of water scarcity; if it is less than 500 cubic meters per capita per year, it indicates conditions of absolute water scarcity. According to this indicator, the region does not look good. Most of the countries are facing either scarcity or absolute s car ci t y.
  • Water scarcity is not so much about how much water there is and more about what it is being used f or
  • an archetypal Malthusian narrative. Eighteenth century scholar Thomas Malthus proposed that the combination of a limited resource base, only growing at an arithmetic rate, and an expanding population, growing at a geometric rate, would inevitably lead to a point where the system’s capacity to support that population was exceeded and crisis would result. This notion, so simplistic and yet so enduring, undergirds much of the writing about water in the Middle East
  • A larger population means more people drinking, cleaning their homes and bodies, washing clothes and cooking. These daily activities do not, however, require all that much water relative to other water uses
  • n annual allocation of 20 cubic meters per capita is sufficient to cover consumption and basic hygiene needs
  • In cities like Amman and Beirut, many neighborhoods only receive running water for a few hours a day; in war-torn Yemen, millions lack access to clean water. But the lack experienced by some is more due to the inadequacy of the infrastructures for delivering potable water and removing wastewater than the insufficiency of the resource per se
  • producing more food does not always require more water. There are techniques of applying water to the soil that are less water intensive, allowing for what water specialists term “more crop per drop.”
  • Agriculture consumes the greatest amount of water by far, globally. This pattern is particularly pronounced in the Middle East, where low rainfall across much of the region makes irrigation a necessity for cultivation. Agriculture uses 85 percent of the region’s water.
  • food imports can be seen as a source of “virtual water.”
  • more about politics than population. The reason why Saudi Arabia long subsidized wheat production in the desert with water drawn from fossil aquifers, for instance, was not because it needed to produce more food for a growing population. Instead, this policy was about the government’s interest in becoming more self-sufficient so as to decrease its reliance on other countries and the associated vulnerabilities.
  • there is no direct correlation between population size and agricultural water use. Narratives of population-driven water crises should always be approached with caution
  • Many lower income residents, or people living in informal settlements, lack access to sufficient drinking water and sanitation. Populations in motion, too, can generate challenges for water managers. Refugee camps, for instance, which are amalgamations of people in spaces that were not necessarily designed to support those numbers, often struggle to provide enough water for their displaced population’s day-to-day uses.
  • Efforts to integrate climate change adaptation into water management plans are hampered by more pressing political priorities,
  • A number of countries in the Middle East and North Africa rely on transboundary water resources. The high degree of reliance is evident in an indicator known as the dependency ratio, which is the proportion of a nation’s freshwater resources—both surface and groundwater—that comes from outside that country. Syria and Iraq depend on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, which rise in the mountainous region of southeastern Turkey. Egypt sources most of its water from the Nile, a river basin that spans 11 countries. Jordan’s two main surface water resources, the Jordan and Yarmouk rivers, are shared with its neighbors. Israel taps into surface and groundwater resources that traverse borders with the West Bank, Lebanon and Syria. Kuwait and Bahrain’s groundwater reserves are fed by water flowing laterally underground from Saudi Arabia.
  • available water resources of the Middle East and North Africa are also shifting due to anthropogenic climate change
  • Climate models are consistent in their projections that temperatures across the region are increasing and will continue to do so in coming decades. Higher temperatures mean higher evapotranspiration rates —plants, in other words, will drink more water—and larger losses from open surfaces like reservoirs. Demand from the most water intensive sector, agriculture, will increase.
  • studies suggest that the variability and uncertainty in rainfall timing and intensity is increasing
  • the rise in sea level poses a risk of coastal flooding in deltas, like that of the Shatt al-Arab, on the border of Iraq and Iran, and the Nile Delta as well as other lowlying areas along the Mediterranean coastline
  • In the case of shared aquifers, the added uncertainties surrounding groundwater volumes and flows compound the challenges.
  • despite the dramatic appeal of the idea of a water war, most scholars agree that the concept is misleading. Wars typically have much more complicated origins than a single causal factor, like water. Intrastate disputes over water may be more significant than interstate conflicts. Moreover, a shared resource does not necessarily have to be a source of tension; it can be a source of cooperation
  • Countries in the more arid parts of the Middle East have championed technologies for producing more water. The Gulf states and Israel, for instance, have been leaders in desalination. In these countries, desalinated water now meets the majority of domestic water needs
  • Many of the region’s water bodies are contaminated with sewage, agricultural chemicals and industrial waste,
  • Public awareness campaigns urge residents to conserve water, take shorter showers, turn off the faucet when brushing their teeth, not leave the water running when cleaning dishes and avoid washing their cars
  • Although initiatives are underway to develop solar-powered desalination, these projects are still in their infancy
  • These uses are so small relative to agriculture, though, that their impact is limited.
  • In many countries of the region, farmers reuse agricultural drainage water. If municipal and industrial waste is properly treated, it too can be reused
  • experts have advised authorities to raise the price of water. In most countries of the region, water is priced significantly below its cost of delivery. In some cases, it is free. Egyptian farmers, for instance, do not pay for the water they use on their fields (although they do pay other irrigation-related costs, such as energy for pumps). If they had to pay for water, economists argue, they would not use so much
  • While these measures can be effective at reducing water consumption and easing scarcity, they impose costs and can increase rural poverty without other forms of social protection and support for small farmers. They also risk ignoring the larger contextual factors that shape water use in a home, factory or farm. Policies that seek to mandate a technology, price or behavioral change for the sake of saving water, without recognizing the priorities and perspectives of those who use this water on a daily basis, are unlikely to be successful
  • the challenge of water scarcity and the experience of many within the region who struggle to find sufficient, clean water for their everyday needs and livelihoods is as much about economic priorities, social inequalities and political relations as it is a function of the region’s geography
Michael Fisher

Arab Spring and the Israeli enemy | ArabNews - 0 views

www.arabnews.com/arab-spring-and-israeli-enemy

Saudi Arabia Israel Middle East

shared by Michael Fisher on 12 Oct 12 - No Cached
  • The common thing among all what I saw is that the destruction and the atrocities are not done by an outside enemy. The starvation, the killings and the destruction in these Arab countries are done by the same hands that are supposed to protect and build the unity of these countries and safeguard the people of these countries. So, the question now is that who is the real enemy of the Arab world?The Arab world wasted hundreds of billions of dollars and lost tens of thousands of innocent lives fighting Israel, which they considered is their sworn enemy, an enemy whose existence they never recognized. The Arab world has many enemies and Israel should have been at the bottom of the list. The real enemies of the Arab world are corruption, lack of good education, lack of good health care, lack of freedom, lack of respect for the human lives and finally, the Arab world had many dictators who used the Arab-Israeli conflict to suppress their own people. These dictators’ atrocities against their own people are far worse than all the full-scale Arab-Israeli wars.
  • Michael Fisher on 12 Oct 12
     
    A surprising tone to come out of Saudi Arabia, the writer argues that the Arab conflict with Israel has served to distract Arabs of their real problems--the dictators at home.
Ed Webb

Iraq war costs U.S. more than $2 trillion: study | Reuters - 0 views

www.reuters.com/...iversary-idUSBRE92D0PG20130314

Iraq US USA war economy military

shared by Ed Webb on 14 Mar 13 - No Cached
  • The U.S. war in Iraq has cost $1.7 trillion with an additional $490 billion in benefits owed to war veterans, expenses that could grow to more than $6 trillion over the next four decades counting interest, a study released on Thursday said
  • The war has killed at least 134,000 Iraqi civilians and may have contributed to the deaths of as many as four times that number, according to the Costs of War Project by the Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University.
  • Excluded were indirect deaths caused by the mass exodus of doctors and a devastated infrastructure, for example, while the costs left out trillions of dollars in interest the United States could pay over the next 40 years.
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  • When security forces, insurgents, journalists and humanitarian workers were included, the war's death toll rose to an estimated 176,000 to 189,000
  • The report also examined the burden on U.S. veterans and their families, showing a deep social cost as well as an increase in spending on veterans. The 2011 study found U.S. medical and disability claims for veterans after a decade of war totaled $33 billion. Two years later, that number had risen to $134.7 billion
  • the United States gained little from the war while Iraq was traumatized by it
  • the $212 billion reconstruction effort was largely a failure with most of that money spent on security or lost to waste and fraud
Ed Webb

Saudi Arabia's Energy Crisis | Arabia, the Gulf, and the GCC Blog - 0 views

ncusar.org/...saudi-arabias-energy-crisis

KSA Saudi energy environment economy development renewables

shared by Ed Webb on 24 May 12 - No Cached
  • consuming more and more of its precious petroleum resources, and within a decade may have to begin cutting back on its oil exports to the rest of the world
  • In a recent report entitled, “Burning to Keep Cool: The Hidden Energy Crisis in Saudi Arabia,” Chatham House researchers Glada Lahn and Prof. Paul Stevens said unchecked growth in energy consumption in Saudi Arabia was a “cause for international concern.” If it continues at its present rate, this would threaten the Kingdom’s ability to stabilize world oil markets.
  • Saudi crude export capacity would fall by about 3 million bpd to under 7 million bpd by 2028 unless domestic energy demand growth is checked
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  • Saudi Arabia hopes to buy itself some time with major energy conservation efforts. Saudi Aramco is pursuing an initiative in cooperation with the Kingdom’s utilities and business sector to generate massive energy savings on as rapid a timetable as possible. This initiative includes moves into renewable power sources like solar and wind, plus efforts to slash energy waste and duplication and create a business culture sensitive to energy efficiency
  • Plans to add renewable power would help maintain fiscal balance for another two or three years, but that’s all
  • Saudi Arabia currently relies on oil revenues for about 80 percent of its government spending
  • Chatham House believes “huge economic, social and environmental gains from energy conservation are possible in Saudi Arabia” but it cautions that the longstanding Saudi tradition of low energy prices and the Kingdom’s sluggish bureaucracy pose “challenges” to implementing needed pricing and regulatory reforms.
  • Saudi Arabia is aiming to generate about 10 percent of its power needs from solar energy by the year 2020
Ed Webb

The Oil Drum | IEA Economist Warns about World Oil Supply - 0 views

www.theoildrum.com/5634

oil energy futures future depression recession growth prediction

shared by Ed Webb on 03 Aug 09 - Cached
  • the market power of the very few oil-producing countries that hold substantial reserves of oil – mostly in the Middle East – would increase rapidly as the oil crisis begins to grip after 2010
  • Many people think there will be a recovery in a few years' time but it will be a slow recovery and a fragile recovery and we will have the risk that the recovery will be strangled with higher oil prices.
  • demand after 2010 is expected to exceed dwindling supplies
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  • I fear that most governments, particularly members of the OECD, will waste time trying to downplay the possible ramifications of declining oil production and to assure the public that everything is under control.
Julianne Greco

Dubai clean-up drive nets cars - The National Newspaper - 0 views

www.thenational.ae/...article

Dubai tow cars clean-up environment unemployment

shared by Julianne Greco on 29 Oct 09 - Cached
  • DUBAI // Nearly 40 abandoned vehicles caked in dust were towed away in the first two days of a municipality-led clean-up that has targeted everything from washing machines to furniture.The vehicles were seized as “a symbolic gesture to drive home the message of a clean and green city”, Hassan Makki, the director of waste management, said yesterday.
  • The local campaign runs later than in the rest of the world because of Dubai’s weather conditions. Mr Makki said it was aimed at raising awareness about the significance of environmental protection.
Jim Franklin

BBC NEWS | Middle East | Gaza thirsts as sewage crisis mounts - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8327146.stm

Israel Gaza sewage water treatment plant

shared by Jim Franklin on 04 Nov 09 - Cached
  • Gaza's aquifer and only natural freshwater source is "in danger of collapse," the UN is warning.
  • The plant is handling twice its capacity and is only able to partially treat the sewage.
  • In addition, with several years of drought and the digging of hundreds of illegal, unregulated wells, the UN Environmental Programme says at least three times more water is extracted than is replenished each year.
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  • only 5-10% of the water in Gaza's wells - and therefore its taps - now meets World Health Organization guidelines, even after it has been chlorinated.
  • "It's like sea water," says local resident Shadi Dosh, 27.
  • Another concern is the blood disorder dubbed "blue baby syndrome", which is associated with nitrate pollution.
  • Thirty kilometres of pipes and 11 wells were damaged, and sewage flooded for up to a kilometre after one waste water plant was hit.
Ed Webb

Gaza militants' rockets: Fewer, less accurate than last Hamas-Israel conflict - CSMonit... - 0 views

www.csmonitor.com/...han-last-Hamas-Israel-conflict

Israel Gaza Palestine israelpalestine military spending US USA

shared by Ed Webb on 16 Jul 14 - No Cached
  • A popular narrative about the current face-off between Hamas and other Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip and Israel is that the Israelis, confronted with withering volleys of rocket fire, have had no choice but to respond with overwhelming force and that the failure of the rockets to do much damage has largely been thanks to the country's US-funded Iron Dome missile defense system. But it turns out that compared to the last major escalation between the two sides, the Palestinians in 2014 are firing fewer rockets than in the past, and those rockets they are firing are proving less accurate.
  • When the shooting started this time, after a major Israeli roundup of hundreds of Hamas activists in the West Bank in response to the murder of three teens, Israeli officials asserted that the rocket stockpile in Gaza had grown more powerful and accurate. Based on the evidence of the past few weeks, "more accurate" does not seem an apt description.
  • There are only half as many hits on urban areas per day. This is because the rockets are less numerous and less accurate, while the interception rate is steady
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  • That Iron Dome is overwhelmingly effective has become an article of faith for many Israelis and the programs backers in Congress. But Theodore Postol at MIT disagrees. An earlier piece in the MIT Technology Review quoting Dr. Postol saying Iron Dome has been largely ineffective led to a flood of furious complaints, prompting the piece he released last night. Reaction "was so negative, and angered so many people, particularly Israelis, that we asked Professor Postol to explain how he came to his conclusions and to show his data," the publication's editors wrote. 
  • rather than Iron Dome, the explanation for low Israeli casualties is the small size of the explosives in the rockets and an excellent Israeli early warning system and network of bomb shelters. The argument is of more than academic interest. The US has spent $721 million on the system for Israel since 2011 and yesterday a Senate subcommittee voted to roughly double spending on the program to $350 million in the next fiscal year. Postol argues this is wasted money, since the payloads of Gaza rockets are so small (from 1-2 pounds up to about 30 pounds of explosives against 1,000 pounds or more in Israel's bombs) they can't harm bunkers (bunkers would be much less effective against serious artillery such as is in Israel's arsenal).
Ed Webb

Saudi Arabia and Hungary sign nuclear energy pact | Middle East Eye - 1 views

www.middleeasteye.net/...-nuclear-energy-pact-226166559

KSA Saudi Hungary nuclear energy oil sustainability geopolitics

shared by Ed Webb on 19 Oct 15 - No Cached
  • Oil giant Saudi Arabia, which is trying to diversify its energy sources, signed an agreement on Monday with Hungary to cooperate in the use of atomic energy.It is the latest pact of its kind signed by Riyadh, which earlier this year reached similar agreements with Russia and South Korea.
  • cooperation in reactor design, construction and operation, security, waste management and training
  • help the kingdom to establish atomic and renewable energy in a sustainable way to help preserve depleting hydrocarbon resources
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  • Saudi Arabia is entirely dependent on oil and gas for its electricity production, and according to SPA its energy demand is growing between six and eight percent annually
  • France and Saudi Arabia announced a feasibility study for building two nuclear reactors in the kingdom
Ed Webb

Monsters of Our Own Imaginings | Foreign Policy - 1 views

foreignpolicy.com/...russels-bombings-islamic-state

terror terrorism foreignpolicy IR analysis opinion GWOT walt Belgium ISIS Qaeda

shared by Ed Webb on 03 Apr 16 - No Cached
  • Terrorist attacks have occurred in Europe, America, Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and many other places, and no level of surveillance, police presence, border controls, drone strikes, targeted killings, or enhanced interrogation is going to prevent every one of them. Even if we could provide absolutely air-tight protection around one type of target, others targets would remain exposed
  • the belief that we could eliminate the danger entirely is no more realistic than thinking better health care will grant you eternal life. For this reason, condemning politicians for failing to prevent every single attack is counterproductive — and possibly dangerous — because it encourages leaders to go overboard in the pursuit of perfect security and to waste time and money that could be better spent on other things. Even worse, the fear of being blamed for “not doing enough” will lead some leaders to take steps that make the problem worse — like bombing distant countries — merely to look and sound tough and resolute.
  • there is no magic key to stopping terrorism because the motivations for it are so varied. Sometimes it stems from anger and opposition to foreign occupation or perceived foreign interference — as with the Tamil Tigers, Irish Republican Army, al Qaeda, Hezbollah, or Hamas. In other cases, it arises from opposition to a corrupt and despised ruling elite. Or it could be both: Osama bin Laden was equally angry at “crusader” nations for interfering in the Muslim world and at the Arab governments he believed were in cahoots with them. In the West, homegrown terrorists such as Anders Breivik or Timothy McVeigh are driven to mass murder by misguided anger at political systems they (falsely) believe are betraying their nation’s core values. Sometimes terrorism arises from perverted religious beliefs; at other times the motivating ideology is wholly secular. Because so many different grievances can lead individuals or groups to employ terrorist methods, there is no single policy response that could make the problem disappear forever.
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  • Compared with other risks to human life and well-being, contemporary international terrorism remains a minor problem
  • The Islamic State wouldn’t have to use terrorism if it were strong enough to advance its cause through normal means or if its message were attractive enough to command the loyalty of more than a miniscule fraction of the world’s population (or the world’s Muslims, for that matter). Because it lacks abundant resources and its message is toxic to most people, the Islamic State has to rely on suicide attacks, beheadings, and violent videos to try to scare us into doing something stupid. The Islamic State cannot conquer Europe and impose its weird version of Islam on the more than 500 million people who live there; the most it can hope for is to get European countries to do self-destructive things to themselves in response. Similarly, neither al Qaeda, the Islamic State, nor other extremists could destroy the U.S. economy, undermine the U.S. military, or weaken American resolve directly; but they did achieve some of their goals when they provoked us into invading Iraq and when they convinced two presidents to pour hundreds of billions of dollars into the bottomless pit in Afghanistan.
  • the same toxic blend of media and politics that brought us Donald Trump’s candidacy makes it nearly impossible to have a rational assessment of terrorism
  • Newspapers, radio, cable news channels, and assorted websites all live for events like this, and they know that hyping the danger will keep people reading, listening, and watching. The Islamic State and its partners really couldn’t ask for a better ally, because overheated media coverage makes weak groups seem more powerful than they really are and helps convince the public they are at greater risk than is in fact the case. As long as media coverage continues to provide the Islamic State et al. with such free and effective publicity, why should these groups ever abandon such tactics?
  • The Islamic State killed 31 people in Brussels on Tuesday, but more than half a billion people in Europe were just fine on that day. So when the British government raised the “threat level” and told its citizens to avoid “all but essential travel” to Belgium following Tuesday’s attacks, it is demonstrating a decidedly non-Churchillian panic. Needless to say, that is precisely what groups like the Islamic State want to provoke.
  • Terrorism is not really the problem; the problem is how we respond to it
  • At the moment, the challenge of contemporary terrorism seems to be bringing out not the best in the West — but the worst. Instead of resolution and grit, we get bluster and hyperbole. Instead of measured threat assessments, patient and careful strategizing, and a realistic sense of what can and cannot be achieved, we get symbolic gestures, the abandonment of our own principles, and political posturing.
  • how would a grown-up like Marshall or Dwight D. Eisenhower respond to this danger? No doubt they’d see it as a serious problem, but anyone who had witnessed the carnage of a world war would not be cowed by intermittent acts of extremist violence, no matter how shocking they are to our sensibilities. They’d use the bully pulpit to shame the fearmongers on Fox and CNN, and they’d never miss an opportunity to remind us that the danger is not, in fact, that great and that we should not, and cannot, live our lives in fear of every shadow and in thrall to monsters of our own imaginings. They would encourage us to live our daily lives as we always have, confident that our societies possess a strength and resilience that will easily outlast the weak and timorous groups that are trying to disrupt us. And then, this summer, they’d take a European vacation.
Ed Webb

Can Cairo stave off discontent over soaring prices? - 0 views

www.al-monitor.com/...g-discontent-prices-bread.html

Egypt economy food austerity IMF politics Sisi

shared by Ed Webb on 13 Mar 17 - No Cached
  • As pressure builds on Egyptian livelihoods following the devaluation of the pound and the slashing of fuel subsidies in November, some analysts are wondering if another uprising is looming on the horizon for Egypt. They warn that a new wave of unrest would be bloodier than the 2011 uprising and could spell disaster for the country, still reeling from the turbulent post-revolution transition.
  • Prices of basic food items, medicine, transport and housing have soared, prompting Egyptians to cut spending to make ends meet. The prices of some basic food items have shot up by up to 40%, according to CAPMAS, the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics
  • protests broke out in at least four Egyptian provinces March 7. The demonstrations were triggered by bread shortages in some bakeries after Supply Minister Aly Moselhy announced a new bread subsidies system that he defended as “necessary to curb waste and corruption.” Hundreds of demonstrators blocked roads and cut railways in Alexandria, Giza, Kafr El Sheikh and Minya in protest at the minister’s abrupt decision to reduce the share of bread allotted to holders of paper ration cards to 500 loaves per bakery a day from the original 1,000 and 4,000 loaves (depending on the number of consumers in the bakery’s vicinity.)
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  • The decision to implement the new system was quickly reversed, however, over fears that the simmering bread crisis could provoke wider tumult. Seeking to allay citizens’ concerns that the move was a prelude to a reduction in their quotas of subsidized bread, Moselhy held a televised press conference on the day of the protests, apologizing to “all citizens who had not received bread” and asserting that their quotas would remain untouched. Promising to resolve the crisis within 48 hours, he blamed bakery owners for the crisis, hinting they were making profits off the subsidized flour they received from the government.
  • In the last six years, government spending on food and fuel subsidies has represented more than a quarter of annual government expenditure (more than the country spends on education and health services combined)
  • a thriving black market for the subsidized wheat, which is often resold by the bakeries at a profit rather than turned into bread
  • “The patience of Egyptians is wearing thin,” Cairo University political scientist Hassan Nafaa told Al-Monitor. “Despite the economic pressures they are facing, citizens have so far restrained themselves from protesting because they are weary after two revolutions. They also fear further turmoil as they see the civil wars in some of the neighboring Arab countries. But if people are hungry and if their basic needs are not met, there is likely to be another rebellion,” he warned, adding that if that happens, “It would be messy and bloody.”
  • Tensions have been simmering since the pound’s depreciation — a key requirement by the International Monetary Fund for Egypt to secure a $12 billion loan needed to finance the country’s budget deficit and shore up dwindling foreign currency reserves. Economists and analysts have lauded the flotation as “a much-needed reform that would restore investors’ confidence in the economy, helping foster growth and job creation.”
  • shrinking middle class was already struggling with flat wages, high inflation and mounting unemployment
  • Sisi’s approval ratings, which according to a poll conducted in mid-December 2016 by Baseera (Egyptian Center for Public Opinion Research) fell by 50% during his second year in office
  • the weak currency is helping the economy by boosting exports and luring back tourists. A 25% increase in non-petroleum exports in January (compared with the same month last year), along with new loans from the IMF and other sources, is beefing up foreign currency reserves, according to The Economist. The weaker currency is also proving to be a blessing in disguise for local manufacturers as more consumers are opting to purchase local products, which are more affordable than their imported alternatives
  • The real test will be the government’s ability to stave off unrest that could undermine the progress made so far. Nafaa said it is possible to quell the rising anger over soaring prices “through more equitable distribution of wealth, better communication of government policies, transparency and accountability.”
  • “The government must also ease the crackdown on dissent, release detainees who have not committed terror crimes and bring more youths on board,”
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