11 firms qualify for Dead-Red Canal
Jordan Times
June 25, 2007
AMMAN (AFP) --
Eleven firms have qualified to submit a feasibility study to build a canal which would save the slowly evaporating Dead Sea by replenishing it with water from the Red Sea, an official said Monday.
The 25-year project to build a canal linking the two seas would also solve a severe water shortage in the region of Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian territories, officials said.
Jordanian Water Minister Zafer al-Aalem announced that 11 firms would be invited to "carry out a technical and environmental feasibility study for the Red Sea-Dead Sea canal," the Petra news agency reported.
"At the end of this month the World Bank will ask these firms to submit their offers," al-Aalem said, adding that the firms have until September 15 to present their projects. He did not identify the companies.
Once the proposals are in hand, representatives from Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority will meet in Paris with the World Bank to examine the offers and announce two winners, he said.
Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority agreed in December to launch a feasibility study for the massive project, that has been on the drawing board for years but has stalled amid regional tensions.
The Dead Sea is the world's lowest and most saline body of water. Its level has been dropping by a meter (three feet) annually.
France, the Netherlands, Japan and the United States have committed nine million dollars to finance the two-year study estimated to cost around 15.5 million dollars. It will be managed by the World Bank.
The canal will take about 25 years to build.
Once desalination plants are in place, it would eventually ease the region's acute water shortage by providing up to 850 million cubic metres (about 30 billion cubic feet) of fresh water to Jordan, Israel and the Palestinian territories, Jordanian officials said.
As one of the 10 most water impoverished countries in the world, Jordan's water deficit exceeds 500 million cubic metres a year, according to the water ministry.