Climate Change
Attacks on Middle East Desalination Plants Highlight Risks of Near-Total Dependence on ‘Fossil Fuel Water’
Destroying the facilities is a violation of international law that could cause a humanitarian crisis in the most water-scare region on Earth. Powering the plants with electricity from fossil fuels poses additional long-term threats.
Recent attacks in the Middle East on desalination plants, facilities that remove salt from seawater, raise the potential for a humanitarian crisis if the region’s freshwater production facilities are subjected to more widespread destruction. The attacks also underscore the region’s heavy reliance on an energy-intensive method of producing drinking water that is powered almost entirely by fossil fuels.