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[Music]
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[Music]
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would you give an overview uh of the
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kinds of Technologies ideas Innovations
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in Israel today that would apply very
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well to other countries that are that
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may be facing problems soon I would I
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would try and divide them into two and
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maybe aan will elaborate on the
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technology of reclaiming and producing
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water but there is the other part and
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this is the consumer and the
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understanding that it's not enough to
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produce more water you have to use it in
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a more efficient way and even the term
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of efficiency or what is sustainability
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is getting to be controversial so if you
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come to a farmer and ask him what is
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water use efficiency his answer will be
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very simple how much money do I make
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from a unit of water and this is the
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advantage of the relatively educated
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Israeli farmer he can adapt diverse and
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change whatever he's doing with the
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water based on Market needs and price of
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the market of the product uh the best
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example is as I usually say and this is
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something that we developed in our
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institutes is aquaculture in dry lands
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growing fish in the desert which seems
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to be a crazy idea makes a lot of sense
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if you measure the efficiency by the
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amount of protein you are producing per
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unit of water and then you realize that
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fish as I say live in water but they
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don't consume the water so the challenge
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is intensive f of aquaculture recycling
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of water using the water after it in
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order to have another product like
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growing dates for suddenly from one unit
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of water you actually have two products
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you have fish and you have dates you
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increase the well-being and the income
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of a farmer and you utilize the water in
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a very smart way it will be there is a
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need to associate it with the
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understanding of people that they at a
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certain stage they'll be Achi change in
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the diet of what we are
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eating and this is just one example and
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there's many others growing uh
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vegetables that not only Thrive of
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celline water but actually take up the
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salt all the way to Growing algae and
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microalgae that again can the water can
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be recycled and the product that you are
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producing as a very high value in the
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market this of course depends on the
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ability of the technology to provide us
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with more good quality water and I think
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Alon is the right person to elaborate on
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this one do we have the Technologies we
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need right now or we're going to be
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having to develop more we do have
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Technologies however the question is
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whether these Technologies are adequate
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for the future but before that to
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continue with what avad
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said the question is whether it will be
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sufficient to dwell on you know
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increasing water use efficiency to solve
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the problem globally and the example
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from Israel is that it's not in Israel
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we reached High use
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efficiency by all means by all standards
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but it's not enough definitely not
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enough in spite of the fact that
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agricultural sector in
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Israel is now getting only 25% of the
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water consumed by the agriculture sector
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is fresh water
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47 years ago the agricultural sector
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consumed 1.1 billion cubic meter of
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water at that time 100% fresh water
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slowly but surely in 45 47 years they
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moved to
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68% treated reclaimed sewage water only
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24% fresh water the rest is fresh breish
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water and Sopris
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they consume the same amount of water
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today 0.998 billion and a big surprise
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the cultural production was not
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negatively affected they produced 10
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times more to be accurate 10.2 times
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more than 47 years ago and bear in mind
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the Israeli GDP during that time is 9
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Times Higher and the population at that
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time was 3.2 million people and now we
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are 7.6 million people so you know it
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can be done however the question is and
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I coming back to the issue whether that
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will be sufficient to solve the problem
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and the answer is
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no we reached the almost the highest
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efficiency and we still have a gap
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between what is available and and the
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demand now demand is a relative term but
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the so-called the motto in our country
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is that the fact that water is a scarce
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commodity should not have a negative
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impact on our economy on our society so
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to close the gap we had to come with
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Novelties and Technologies to treat
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Water by desalination of breish Water by
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desalination of sea water there are many
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ways to go we finally went for those
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Mega plants when we reached
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the solution that we can produce 1 cubic
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of meter from seawater designation
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utilizing 3.75 Kow hour of energy at the
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cost of not energy the global cost of
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between 656 56 to 66 us cents per cubic
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meter and it's
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affordable so that I think the way to go
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and I don't say which way it will be
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developed we have to get our science you
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know full clearance to get wild and come
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up with different different ideas and in
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the water Institute at the benon
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University we actually explore several
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Avenues I cannot tell which will finally
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be materialized and that will be of
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course the most efficient one regarding
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money
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wise yes I'd just like to add some
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qualification to what avard said maybe
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it will lead the discussion uh to a
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little uh different direction uh having
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been a farmer in Israel uh the cost the
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the the value of water is how much money
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you can make from your product not per
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unit of water but per unit cost of water
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so uh so uh the the cost of water is a
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very important ingredient and maybe the
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dominant one in the situation also we
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also talked a lot about food and
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agriculture but in fact in Israel as far
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as I have seen uh industry uses uh at
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least as much War you know globally as
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as agriculture in Israel yeah no no no
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no Statics no you totally wrong I mean
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the is the the industry is consuming
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about 10% of what the of what the
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agricultural sector very low amount
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whatever the industry is described as in
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the statistics that I got from the uh
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Israeli literature where this may be
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when the time when we had a huge textile
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industry which is which is not anymore
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they cannot afford uh the prices uh you
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have to realize that this brings us back
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to cost of of War and pricing and and
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policies and politics well industry
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includes cooling water for power plants
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and for desination plant and so on but
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anyway we'll take whatever they say as
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the truth but they uh fact in fact the
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industry does use water and there is a
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need to reduce the uh consumption and
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improve the quality of the water that
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comes out of out of there too and that's
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you know improve this quality of the
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affluence is really you know you're
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really a challenge and as you probably
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realized we don't see affluence as waste
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effluence is another resource that has
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to be treated and you know later on
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reclaimed and uh uh
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reclaiming effluence from the industry
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is very challenging uh process and we
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try very hard to come up with Solutions
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not because it will provide us with
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additional significant amount of water
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but it because of protecting the
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environment we are we signed the
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Barcelona treaty for not contaminating
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the Mediterranean Sea and uh we are very
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much concerned of that uh a lot of this
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uh a lot of the Innovation then that
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you've you've undergone in Israel has
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been driven by constraints by price um
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that price constraint hasn't hasn't bit
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down in places like the us yet where
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where water's mostly very cheap uh you
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would probably say very underpriced can
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you talk about the importance of price
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and how that may be that really the
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mechanism that that that changes or
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forces change I think that we have to
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understand that uh the Water issue is
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not just availability of water for
00:09:57
consumption and Agriculture and indust
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industry we have to realize that water
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has an impact on every facet of our life
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and this is why water research if you
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want and and developing it is something
00:10:13
that requires an interdisciplinary
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approach from as I mentioned before the
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social problems the education problems
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the energy
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consumption the technology itself and
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finally food production
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so all of it has to be put in a basket
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if you want and then it's up to the
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leadership and the politicians if you
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want to put a real price T not of how
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much does it require to produce a unit
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of water but what is the contribution to
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society in large of this unit of water
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and it's okay to say to a country we
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subsidize our water
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so that we can develop a region in the
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country in Israel if I live in the
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desert I pay the same amount of water as
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someone who lives in the North and
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someone can claim that it's not
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fair but this is a kind of a social uh
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political issue that is confined to the
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policies of a country and this is why
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there is no need to have a global price
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for water and every country has the
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right to do it as long as the decisions
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are really driven by the understanding
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that there are many inputs into it and
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unfortunately sometimes this is not the
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case which leads to wasting of water we
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discussed before of our farmer and sou
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part of France is basically using water
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in a very wasteful way because C of
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politics and policies that have nothing
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to do with the national contribution of
00:12:05
this particular agriculture in in the
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country and one can go side by side your
00:12:11
geographically regions and find this
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kind of if you want stupid decisions we
00:12:17
get cannot be
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explained there is a flat price all over
00:12:21
the country in Israel as a got mentioned
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but different pricing for treated water
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breish fresh breish you know natural
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water and blue So-Cal fresh water for
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the for the agricultural sector as long
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you use the qu allocated by the way it
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changed every year according to the
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situation as long you use the quarter or
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within the quarter it's flat constant
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price if you exceed the quarter
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sometimes they cut the because there is
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no water or the price is elevated
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dramatically the same for domestic use
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the same there is a quarter per family
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with
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reasonable cost it's still
00:13:03
expensive but if you exceed the quarter
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if I want to water my garden I want to
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see some green in front of my eyes I
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have to pay it's a matter of
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priority ex yeah exactly I mean it's the
00:13:17
pricing can be used by the government as
00:13:21
a way of implement policies if you get a
00:13:25
farmer to pay a more much more real
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price for the water he will be driven to
00:13:31
use it more efficiently the best example
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is from the farmers you see many farmers
00:13:35
especially in the netive desert they get
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three types of three types of water at
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the gate the blue fresh more expensive
00:13:45
the green braish quite cheap and in the
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middle is the red water the treated
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sewage water and every farmer has its
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own tanks in the farm and he makes them
00:13:55
aun based on you know the growing season
00:13:58
germination
00:13:59
the crop you know pricing he has to make
00:14:02
it you know he makes the decision but he
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knows as aad said he knows a priori how
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much he pays for every cubic meter he
00:14:11
takes from each of these colored lines
00:14:13
so so being so close to this um as you
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are and having live through the
00:14:18
development of these pretty
00:14:20
extraordinary Technologies are you
00:14:22
hopeful about how the world will handle
00:14:25
water in the future in other words do
00:14:27
you is it your view that well eventually
00:14:30
water is going to get expensive the
00:14:32
price will go up to a point where people
00:14:33
will have to adopt new Behaviors new
00:14:37
technologies and thank goodness that
00:14:38
Technologies are there or are you less
00:14:42
optimistic for reasons you can explain
00:14:44
to me I like to just add one thing which
00:14:46
will maybe also direct the the answer in
00:14:50
addition to what vard Alon said there
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should be in uh the sense of sustainable
00:14:56
development some depletion allowance in
00:14:59
the price okay so because uh water gives
00:15:03
us some things now but we have to take
00:15:07
into account uh the price of it being uh
00:15:11
lowered in quantity in the future okay
00:15:14
and uh there are depletion allowances in
00:15:17
some areas not in not in water but in
00:15:20
some other uh
00:15:22
resources and uh until the world agrees
00:15:26
that uh this kind of depletion allowance
00:15:29
should be included in the price uh in
00:15:31
addition to all of the other costs you
00:15:33
know we we are going to be in in
00:15:36
trouble we are in troubles yeah and uh
00:15:41
the reason I am optimistic is that there
00:15:43
is no other choice so the question is
00:15:46
why just when are we going to wake up
00:15:50
early enough or will it have to go to a
00:15:54
much worse situation and this can be
00:15:59
Carri the way up
00:16:00
to issues of else in Africa or just the
00:16:04
need to dry out our golf courses God
00:16:09
forbid uh I follow avard I'm also
00:16:13
Optimist uh and
00:16:16
I I think that by just reviewing the
00:16:21
scientific
00:16:23
Community we are driven by the market
00:16:26
so-called and I see among my my
00:16:29
colleagues researchers in different
00:16:31
institutes we the scientific Community
00:16:34
work very hard to come up with more
00:16:39
novel methods and later on Technologies
00:16:41
I hope to be able to produce more water
00:16:46
more adequate water in a more efficient
00:16:49
way however we have to take the holistic
00:16:53
approach here don't forget for every
00:16:56
cubic of meter now with the current
00:16:59
technology available we need 3.75 kilow
00:17:02
hour just in the Middle East this year
00:17:06
we desalinate 400 million next year
00:17:10
December
00:17:12
2013 it will be 505 million cubic meters
00:17:16
a year half a billion just for Israel
00:17:18
what about Palestine they need about 300
00:17:21
million what about Hashim Kingdom of
00:17:22
Jordan what about D Syria so then the
00:17:26
amount of fossile oil
00:17:30
becomes significant with all the
00:17:32
consequences so we have to look for as I
00:17:35
said holistic approach and look for
00:17:37
alternative methods with maybe cleaner
00:17:40
energy associated with desalination
00:17:43
whether it's wind driven desalination or
00:17:46
solar energy driven discernation and is
00:17:49
not just you know to create electricity
00:17:51
from solar panels and plug your donation
00:17:54
plan to that it's more sophisticated but
00:17:56
we have to be
00:17:57
concerned we shall be able and and I'm
00:18:01
Optimist we shall be able to meet the
00:18:03
demand for water definitely the question
00:18:06
is whether it will be affordable to the
00:18:09
entire population or only to spe very
00:18:12
special segments or sections and what
00:18:15
will be the toll on the
00:18:17
environment and but we better take think
00:18:20
about it right now and develop it
00:18:23
together not come later you know in 15
00:18:25
years from now coming with the
00:18:27
technology then we say okay yes but it
00:18:28
has a very significant impact negative
00:18:32
impact on the environment then it will
00:18:34
be too late
00:18:36
um people might have thought and it
00:18:38
still may be the case that the Middle
00:18:40
East would be the test case for all of
00:18:42
this but we've seen this year with the
00:18:45
severe droughts in the United States and
00:18:47
the effects on Lower production
00:18:51
therefore the effects on prices the real
00:18:53
spike in in food prices food shortages
00:18:56
that sort of thing um and um depending
00:18:59
on one's view on climate change you know
00:19:02
one view is that that's going to become
00:19:04
the norm um and so that is that the
00:19:07
beginning of a wakeup call for the rest
00:19:09
of the world you in the Middle East have
00:19:11
faced this for a long time and have had
00:19:13
a lot of time to think about it the rest
00:19:14
of the world has not we don't have that
00:19:16
much of dry farming in the Middle East
00:19:19
ah so what I mean the So-Cal annual
00:19:22
fluctuations has more impact on die
00:19:25
farming rather than on irrigated land so
00:19:28
well maybe it might be a wakeup call
00:19:30
it's too early to say but you know at
00:19:31
least we we can hear the the Bell okay
00:19:36
um any final words before we stop here
00:19:38
no I just to the wakeup call I mean
00:19:40
there are so many wakeup calls that uh
00:19:44
human uh nature tendency is to ignore
00:19:47
them all uh there's a wakeup call on
00:19:50
energy there is a wake up call on food
00:19:53
there is wake up call on on environment
00:19:56
and what we as scientist what we are
00:20:00
trying to say is the same wake up call
00:20:03
by the time you exaggerate on one end
00:20:06
you causing a problem in the other one
00:20:08
and it's a longside it's the holistic
00:20:10
approach we have to understand and this
00:20:12
goes all the way even to the way we
00:20:14
educate our students the understanding
00:20:17
that the need to be a good scientist
00:20:20
requires a background in an
00:20:23
interdisciplinary the ability to tackle
00:20:25
an issue on an interdisciplinary
00:20:27
approach and this is again if I may go
00:20:30
back to our backyard to the desert
00:20:33
research institutes this is why you have
00:20:35
this kind of diversity of people dealing
00:20:37
with issues all the way from Desert
00:20:40
architecture how are you going to build
00:20:43
you houses you cities and this is true
00:20:46
not only for Israel Phoenix in Arizona
00:20:50
is facing the same problem as a small
00:20:52
settlement in the Israeli netive it's
00:20:55
even blown up and the bigger problem in
00:20:58
F next Arizona so it's desert
00:21:01
architecture it is energy it is
00:21:03
education it is social issues and
00:21:06
everything if you want it's the same
00:21:09
wakeup call we are going to face and we
00:21:12
are actually facing a problem and the
00:21:15
wakeup call is not only for the
00:21:18
scientific Community but also for the
00:21:21
politicians and the leaders because
00:21:23
finally scientists don't make decisions
00:21:27
thanks God they don't finally they
00:21:29
finally may be able to provide a good
00:21:33
advice yeah I think this is the m very
00:21:35
important point you know we should make
00:21:38
the advice but you know we have to
00:21:40
educate the politicians as well yeah I
00:21:42
think that uh demand and pricing uh seem
00:21:47
to be U more dominant than the
00:21:50
scientific
00:21:51
inventions
00:21:53
unfortunately and uh policy and uh and
00:21:56
you know we can blame the quote unquote
00:21:59
politicians but we elect them usually so
00:22:02
uh you know if the people don't
00:22:04
understand uh the problems then we like
00:22:07
the wrong people so it's again put the
00:22:10
blame on me yeah put the blame on us and
00:22:13
just not to leave that global warming uh
00:22:16
uh issue uh uh open um there was some
00:22:20
brief comments made but whether you
00:22:22
believe in global warming or not there
00:22:24
are two in in
00:22:26
incontrovertible uh uh facts one is
00:22:30
we're doing our best to increase global
00:22:33
warming uh so uh there's no question
00:22:36
about it the emissions of greenhouse
00:22:39
gases are increasing and their effect on
00:22:41
global warming is absolutely true and
00:22:45
the second thing that is also in
00:22:47
controvertible is that we see the
00:22:50
massive melting of the icebergs this is
00:22:53
not the question of the snow caps so uh
00:22:57
something is creating it and to ignore
00:23:00
it and to say that there's no global
00:23:01
warming and will continue I think is a
00:23:04
very bad mistake absolutely it's uh the
00:23:07
lowest level of ice cover for summer
00:23:11
yeah as far as we know as far as we know
00:23:13
uh in in the north correct also in the
00:23:16
South even in there's a very interesting
00:23:19
study just published about the mount Kia
00:23:22
in Africa the eyes disappeared no snow
00:23:26
anymore in the summer time in the sum
00:23:28
time for the first time
00:23:31
ever and they're talking about an ice
00:23:33
free uh North Pole area perhaps in as
00:23:36
little as 10 years in the summer
00:23:39
disappear so ignoring climate change is
00:23:44
is up to the stage of being
00:23:46
ridiculous but on the other hand you see
00:23:48
if we follow the Russians you know they
00:23:50
are very Optimist you know because they
00:23:53
claim more land in Siberia will join the
00:23:56
productive land because of the you know
00:23:59
yeah ating yeah it's a joke yeah but you
00:24:02
know they claim that more land will be
00:24:04
able to be cultivated now in Siberia we
00:24:06
should see and they're selling cruises
00:24:08
in the bearing the sea
00:24:11
already so there is an upside yeah yeah
00:24:15
thank you very much for joining us our
00:24:16
pleasure thank you very interesting
00:24:25
[Music]
