By John — Desalination News
Jordan’s roughly $6 billion desalination megaproject, the Aqaba-Amman Water Desalination and Conveyance Project, is drawing fresh scrutiny over how the plant that is meant to secure the country’s water future will be powered — and whether that choice ties Jordan more tightly to natural gas imported from Israel, according to reporting published October 1 by Climate Home News.
The project, often referred to as Jordan’s National Water Carrier, will desalinate roughly 300 million cubic meters of Red Sea water annually at Aqaba and pump it more than 400 kilometers north through the desert to the capital, Amman. Construction is targeted for completion around 2030, and the scheme is expected to supply somewhere between 40% and 45% of Jordan’s municipal water needs once operational — a significant step for a country where half of households currently receive piped water less than 24 hours a week.
The project’s financing was confirmed as the largest single investment the Green Climate Fund (GCF) has made to date: $295 million, split between a $220 million loan and a $75 million grant, according to the GCF’s own project filing. That sits alongside a much larger co-financing package, with total project cost estimated at $6.3 billion. The World Bank’s International Finance Corporation (IFC) is acting as lead implementing entity, with French firms Meridiam and Suez involved in construction.
The sticking point, according to the Climate Home News report, is energy. The project includes a purpose-built solar farm of about 281 megawatts peak capacity, but that is only expected to cover a maximum of 27% of the desalination and pumping plant’s substantial electricity needs — moving hundreds of millions of cubic meters of water over such a distance and elevation is energy-intensive. The remaining roughly 73% would be drawn from Jordan’s national grid, which was about 58% gas-fired as of 2024. A large share of that gas is imported from Israel, with Jordan’s national electricity company reportedly sourcing around 57% of its power from Israeli gas.
That dependency has become more politically charged since the Gaza war strained relations between Amman and Jerusalem, with Jordanian officials noting Israel has at times threatened to cut water transfers to Jordan from 100 million to 50 million cubic meters a year — part of the rationale cited for pressing ahead with desalination regardless of the energy trade-off. But the same geopolitical tension is fueling criticism that a flagship climate-finance project is set to lock in reliance on gas from a neighbor with which relations remain fraught. Jordan’s former water minister, Motasem Saidan, was quoted warning that “relying on neighbouring countries for sources … is risky,” while an Electricity Workers’ Union activist, Mahmoud Amin Al-Hayari, argued the plant “will not be viable if we depend on gas supplied by the Israeli occupation.”
Climate campaigners and at least one independent technical reviewer have gone further, questioning whether the project meets the bar it was funded on. The GCF’s own Independent Technical Advisory Panel reportedly warned the design was “difficult to reconcile with climate finance objectives,” and an analyst at the energy think tank Ember argued the plant could realistically run on roughly 80% solar power with battery storage added, given how far battery costs have fallen and how sunny Jordan’s climate is. The IFC and GCF leadership have defended the current design, with the IFC reportedly characterizing a fully renewable-powered alternative as “too expensive and impractical,” and GCF executive director Mafalda Duarte calling the project a “milestone” for the region regardless. Non-renewable power use associated with the plant’s operation has been estimated as equivalent to the annual emissions of roughly 160,000 petrol cars, a figure the project’s backers say is still a reasonable trade-off against securing drinking water for a country where water scarcity is only intensifying.
The debate does not appear likely to delay construction, which remains on track for substantial completion by 2030 under the IFC-led financing structure. But it illustrates a tension increasingly visible across major climate-adaptation infrastructure: large, urgently needed water projects that still depend on fossil generation to run, even as the institutions funding them promote a low-carbon mandate.
(Source: Climate Home News, Green Climate Fund)