Red Sea Water Strain: Supply Every Six to Ten Days, New Hurghada Desalination Plant Under Study

Water reaches taps in parts of Red Sea governorate only once every six to ten days, a gap that bites hardest on families through the summer, Al-Masry Al-Youm reported on 30 July, describing strain that runs from Hurghada south through Safaga, Al-Quseir, Marsa Alam and Berenice.

The governorate has no natural surface water. It depends on desalination and on pipelines bringing Nile water along the Kreimat and Qena lines, the paper said.

Gamal El-Sleik, a Red Sea member of the Senate, told Al-Masry Al-Youm that reliable water service has become a fundamental criterion for quality of life and for attracting investment, and that hotels need stable supply year-round. Sayed El-Gabry, head of the tourism companies' chamber, said Hurghada must balance residents' needs against hundreds of hotels and tourist villages drawing large volumes.

Development expert Yasir Khalil said the shortage should be treated as a strategic file requiring permanent solutions extending for decades ahead, not as a seasonal crisis. Tourism expert Essam Ali called water essential to the competitiveness of tourist cities.

Remedies raised in the report include building desalination capacity before shortfalls appear, upgrading distribution networks, cutting losses through better monitoring, running plants on solar and wind to lower costs, reusing treated water for irrigation, and tightening consumption inside tourist facilities.

A day later, on 31 July, Red Sea governor Walid El-Barqi inspected Hurghada's gas power station and the adjacent sea intake to assess a site for a new drinking-water desalination plant, Al-Ahram's Gate reported. He said expanding desalination is intended to deliver radical solutions to water scarcity, especially in summer, for residents and tourists alike.

The power station produces more than the city consumes and could supply Hurghada on its own if the national grid failed, he said. He was accompanied by governorate secretary-general Hassan Moafi and water and sanitation board chairman Bahaa Abdel Moneim Sayed.