Egypt has been increasingly turning to desalination to meet pressing water needs, Patrick Werr writes in The National. He says desalination is becoming more attractive especially as Ethiopia begins filling the reservoir of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam that could reduce the flow of the Nile by as much as 20%. Werr says the option is becoming even more attractive as the cost of desalination is becoming cheaper. Wee notes that “Egypt’s future is almost certainly in desalination. But the government should eventually begin charging more for traditional sources of water to reflect its real value, something that will not be popular among a population that has enjoyed free water for millennia. At the same time, it must monitor desalination plants, whose brine and hot run-off can harm the marine environment, to ensure their negative effects are minimal.”

…Separately, the UK’s Sheffield University is collaborating with Port Said University to develop a hybrid system that uses biogas and solar power to desalinate water in Egypt, according to Filtration+Separation magazine. “The collaborative team will investigate whether biogas produced from biological matter (such as cattle manure) could be used as a feasible backup to solar,” the piece says. The two-year project targets communities that are most in need.