Subjects like desalination tie into the 'Sustainable tourism' article: how to get enough fresh water to serve larger numbers of people, both tourists and workers.
some basic information: The Red Sea Governorate has an area of 130,000 km, weather in plains is mainly dry and hot, highlands are colder and not populated, rainfall is very low, and is not considered as a water resource at all.
the total population is 220,000, some are Bedouin and the rest are located in small cities.
The water resources in Red Sea can be classified into: underground water, potable water transported by pipeline, and desalinated water. Also, desalination units are categorized as government-owned units (Ministry of Development) and the private sector owned units.
The uses of the Red Sea water: Agriculture (seasonal and the cultivated area is very small, and there is no any plans for expansion in agriculture), Domestic (the population is very low in this area, and the south of Red Sea Governorate only relies on desalination, and the rest of the cities rely on water from the Nile), Tourism (Tourism activities are supplied mainly by desalinated water), Recreational ( Recreational areas are irrigated by treated sewage water. Each resort treats its wasted water and uses it in garden irrigation).
There are two main lines (Fig. 6 and Table 1):
The first is Qena-Safaga pipeline with total length of 180 km. There are
three parallel lines with different diameters. They have been erected on
different periods from 1967 to 2000; the diameters are 200 mm, 300 mm and
400 mm. They are supported by 13 pumping stations distributed on the
distance from Qena to Safaga. The total capacity of the lines is 17,000 m3/d
distributed on three cities: Hurghada, Safaga and El-Quseir as 7000 m3/d,
5000 m3/d and 5000 m3/d, respectively, Table 1.
The second line is the Koraimat pipeline, which has been erected
recently on 1997 with diameter 1000 mm until Ras Ghareb and 600 mm to
Hurghada. The total capacity of the pipeline is 28,000 m3/d distributed on
three cities: Zaafarana, Ras Ghareb and Hurghada as 5500 m3/d, 5000 m3/d
and 17,500 m3/d, respectively. There are seven pumping stations on the
pipeline. The total cost of this pipeline is 660 millions L.E. which was equivalent to $US 194 millions. The installation cost per m3 depreciated on
15 years is 2.15 L.E./m3 or $US 0.64. The running cost including maintenance
cost is 1.5 L.E. The total cost including installation cost is 3.5 L.E. which
equivalent approximately to one US$.
Desalinated Water
Most of the Red Sea region uses desalination to respond to water demand
requirements. There are two categories of desalination units: first is
government-owned units (Ministry of Development); second is the privatesector-
owned units.
Table 2 presents the government-owned desalination units and the
technology used. Table 3 presents the private-sector-desalination units. The
total amount of desalinated water is 34,750 m3/d or 12.68 Mm3/y. The units
using Reverse Osmosis (RO) technology produce 25,250 m3/d and the vapor
compression (VC) produce 4500 m3/d.
Credentials of Authors:
Magdy Abou Rayan
M.A., Faculty of Engineering, El Mansoura University, Egypt
Berge Djebedjian
B., Faculty of Engineering, El Mansoura University, Egypt
Ibrahim Khaled
I., Water Department, Sinai Development Authority, Egypt
Salah El-Sarraf
Water Desalination, Soma Bay, Red Sea, Egypt
Seventh International Water Technology Conference, IWTC 2003, Cairo, Egypt
It's an old source so should be used minimally and not for updated information just general