Water supply and sanitation in Saudi Arabia is characterized by challenges and achievements. One of the main challenges is water scarcity. In order to overcome water scarcity, substantial investments have been undertaken in seawater desalination, water distribution, sewerage and wastewater treatment. Today about 50% of drinking water comes from desalination, 40% from the mining of non-renewable groundwater and only 10% from surface water in the mountainous southwest of the country. The capital Riyadh, located in the heart of the country, is supplied with desalinated water pumped from the Persian Gulf over a distance of 467 km. Water is provided almost for free to residential users. Despite improvements, service quality remains poor, for example in terms of continuity of supply. Another challenge is weak institutional capacity and governance, reflecting general characteristics of the public sector in Saudi Arabia. Among the achievements is a significant increases in desalination, and in access to water, the expansion of wastewater treatment, as well as the use of treated effluent for the irrigation of urban green spaces, and for agriculture.
Since 2000, the government has increasingly relied on the private sector to operate water and sanitation infrastructure, beginning with desalination and wastewater treatment plants. Since the creation of the National Water Company (NWC) in 2008, the operation of urban water distribution systems in the four largest cities has gradually been delegated to private companies as well. The apparent paradox of very low water tariffs and water privatization is explained by government subsidies. The government buys desalinated water from private operators at high prices and resells the bulk water for free. Likewise, the government directly pays private operators that run the water distribution and sewer systems of large cities under management contracts. Furthermore, it fully subsidizes investments in water distribution and sewers. Water utilities are expected to recover an increasing share of their costs from the sale of treated effluent to industries. In January 2016 water and sewer tariffs were increased for the first time in more than a decade, which resulted in discontent and in the sacking of the Minister of Water and Energy Abdullah Al-Hussayen in April 2016.
Access According to the Joint Monitoring Program (JMP) for Water Supply and Sanitation of the WHO and UNICEF, the latest reliable source on access to water and sanitation in Saudi Arabia is the 2004 census. It indicates that 97% of the population had access to an improved source of drinking water and 99% had access to improved sanitation. For 2015, the JMP estimates that access to sanitation increased to 100%. Sanitation was primarily through on-site solutions and only about 40% of the population was connected to sewers. In 2015, still 886 thousand people lacked access to "improved" water.WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme for Water Supply and Sanitation
Service quality
Drinking water. Despite clear improvements, the quality of service remains insufficient. For example, few cities enjoy continued service, and water pressure is often inadequate. In Riyadh water was available only once every 2.5 days in 2011, while in Jeddah it is available only every 9 days. This is still better than in 2008, when the respective figures were 5 and 23 days.Global Water Intelligence:Becoming a world-class water utility, April 2011 While systematic data on service quality are now available for several cities, they are not publicly available. In some localities groundwater used for drinking water supply is naturally contaminated with levels of fluoride in excess of the recommended level of 0.7 to 1.2 mg/L. For example, a 1990 study showed that the fluoride level in drinking water in Mecca was 2.5 mg/L.al-Khateeb TL, Darwish SK, Bastawi AE, O'Mullane DM.:Dental caries in children residing in communities in Saudi Arabia with differing levels of natural fluoride in the drinking water , Community Dent Health. 1990 Jun;7(2):165-71. In Riyadh the level of fluoride is reduced far below the recommended level by blending groundwater with desalinated seawater.Abdulrahman I. Alabdula'aly:Fluoride Content in Drinking Water Supplies of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia , Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, December 1997, Volume 48, Issue 3, pp 261-272
Wastewater. There are 33 wastewater treatment plants with a capacity of 748 million cubic meters per year, and 15 more are under construction. Much of the treated wastewater is being reused to water green spaces in the cities (landscaping), for irrigation in agriculture and other uses.
Concentrated sewage from septic tanks is collected through trucks. In Jeddah the trucks dumped sewage for 25 years in a valley that was euphemistically called the "Musk Lake". The pond, holding more than 50 million cubic meters of sewage, almost overflowed during heavy rains in November 2009 threatening to flood parts of the city. After that, the King ordered the lake to be dried up within a year with the help of the National Water Company.
Water use Total municipal water use in Saudi Arabia has been estimated at 2.28 cubic kilometers per year in 2010, or 13% of total water use. Agriculture accounts for 83% of water use and industry for only 4%. Demand has been growing at the rate of 4.3% per annum (average for the period 1999–2004), in tandem with urban population growth (around 3%). Water supply is usually not metered, neither at the source nor the distribution point. It is tentatively estimated that average water consumption for those connected to the network is about 235 liters per capita per day, a level lower than in the United States.W.A. Abderrahman: Water Management in ArRiyadh, International Journal of Water Resources Development, Vol. 22, No. 2, June 2006, p. 281
Water reuse in Saudi Arabia is growing, both at the level of buildings and at the level of cities. For example, ablution water in mosques is being reused for the flushing of toilets.Walid A. Abderrahman:Water demand management in Saudi Arabia , in: Water Management in Islam, IDRC, 2001, Edited by Naser I. Faruqui, Asit K. Biswas, and Murad J. Bino At the city level, treated wastewater is being reused for landscaping, irrigation and in industries such as refining. In Riyadh 50 million cubic meter per year is pumped over and 60m elevation to irrigate 15,000 hectares of wheat, fodder, orchards and palm trees.World Bank:A Water Sector Assessment Report on the Countries of the Cooperation Council of the Arab States of the Gulf , 2005, p. 17
Water conservation measures, such as awareness campaigns through the media and educational pamphlets, have been carried out. In addition, in Riyadh a leakage control program has been carried out and a special, higher water tariff has been introduced. Furthermore, free water appliances (taps, shower heads, toilet boxes) were distributed, reportedly resulting in a decrease of residential water use of between 25 and 35%.W.A. Abderrahman:Water Management in ArRiyadh, International Journal of Water Resources Development, Vol. 22, No. 2, June 2006, p. 287
An unknown, but large proportion of the population is dependent on supply through water tankers. For example, Riyadh experiences water shortages and intermittent supply, especially during the summer peak demand. To cope with the shortage, 18 million cubic meters of water was distributed during one summer by private contractors. With the commissioning of a new large well field at Al Honai this problem has been reduced.
Water resources
Saudi Arabia is one of the driest regions in the world, with no perennial rivers. Water is obtained from four distinct sources:
non-renewable groundwater from the deep fossil aquifers desalinated water surface water renewable groundwater from shallow alluvial aquifers
Only the last two sources are renewable. Their volume, however, is minimal. Desalination plants provide about half the country's drinking water. About 40% comes from groundwater. The remainder comes from surface water (about 10%). Desalinated water is prevalent along the coasts, surface water in the southwest region and groundwater elsewhere. The capital Riyadh, however, is supplied to a great extent with desalinated water pumped from the Persian Gulf over 467 km to the city located in the heart of the country.
Fossil groundwater Current levels of groundwater extraction far exceed the level of natural recharge: Groundwater is being "mined". For example, the Al-Ahsa aquifer in the Eastern Province experienced a drop of 150 meters over the past 25 years. Since the usable volume of the aquifers is not known, it is not clear how long groundwater mining can be sustained. Estimates of the groundwater stored in the principal aquifers are controversial. According to one estimate, the amount of water stored before modern farming started was 500 billion cubic meters, equivalent to the amount of water in Lake Erie, and by 2012 about 80% of that water had been extracted.
A 2025 study focusing on the urban coastal areas of Qatif, Eastern Province found that up to 35.3% of the tested groundwater samples were classified as unsuitable for human consumption due to elevated concentrations of trace and toxic elements including arsenic and chromium. The research indicated that arsenic presents a high carcinogenic risk in 77% of the samples.
Desalination Saudi Arabia is the largest producer of desalinated water in the world. In 2011 the volume of water supplied by the country's 27 desalination plants at 17 locations was 3.3 million m3/day (1.2 billion m3/year). 6 plants are located on the East Coast and 21 plants on the Red Sea Coast. 12 plants use multi-stage flash distillation (MSF) and 7 plants use multi-effect distillation (MED). Both MSF and MED plants are integrated with power plants (dual-purpose plants), using steam from the power plants as a source of energy. 8 plants are single-purpose plants that use reverse osmosis (RO) technology and power from the grid. By far the largest plant in 2012, Jubail II on the East Coast, is a MSF plant built in subsequent stages since 1983 with a capacity of almost 950,000 m3/day that supplies Riyadh. The largest RO plant in 2012 was located in Yanbu on the Red Sea. It supplies the city of Medina and has a capacity of 128,000 m3/day. The MED plants are much smaller. Mecca receives its water from plants in Jeddah and Shoaiba, just south of Jeddah. Ras al Khair, the largest plant of the country with a capacity of 1 million m3/day was opened in 2014, using RO technology.
Saudi Arabia holds approximately 35% of the Arab Region's desalination capacity which includes Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauretania, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. Furthermore, water desalination requires immense amount of energy, 25% of Saudi Arabia's oil and gas production is directed towards cogeneration power desalination plants (CPDPs) to generate electricity and produce water. It is estimated by 2030, 50% of Saudi Arabia's local oil and gas will solely be used to meet the rapidly growing demand for water.Al-Hussayen A (2009) Inaugural speech by the minister of water and electricity. Saudi Arabia, Water and Power Forum, Jiddah, Saudi ArabiaBadran, Adnan, et al., editors. Water, Energy, & Food Sustainability in the Middle East. 1st ed., ser. 978-3-319-48920-9, Springer International Publishing, 2017.
Solar desalination