Egypt turns to green desalination

Cairo hopes renewables-based water purification could both narrow the domestic deficit and enable it to realise its green hydrogen ambitions

Egypt is preparing to tender for the construction of a network of desalination plants powered by renewables to address an acute shortage of fresh water and provide feedstock for green hydrogen production. The county’s sovereign wealth fund is seeking partners to invest about $2.5bn to build, own and operate 17 desalination facilities powered by solar and other renewable resources with a combined capacity of 2.8mn m³/d by 2025. Egypt is taking advice and technical support from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation, with the first tenders—for some 1mn m³/d—due in early 2022.  $2.5bn – Projected cost of desalination net