Characterizing water resources and trends of sector wise water consumptions in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Understanding of water resources and trends of water consumptions is important to offer sustainable water resources management strategy. In this research, water resources and trends of water consumptions in Saudi Arabia were investigated. The non-renewable groundwater reserves were estimated to be 259.1–760.6billion cubic meters (BCM) with an effective annual recharge of 886million cubic meters (MCM). The total internal renewable water was estimated to be 2.4BCM/year. Approximately 1.4BCM/year of runoff is collected by 302 dams. The country produces approximately 1.06BCM desalinated water annually. The wastewater treatment plants treat approximately 0.73BCM/year of domestic wastewater from which 0.33BCM is recycled. The water demand in 2009 was 18.51BCM in which 83.5% were for agriculture. From 2004 to 2009, agricultural water demand was decreased by 2.5%/year, while the domestic and industrial water demands were increased by 2.1%/year and 2.2%/year, respectively. Between 1999 and 2008, domestic water subscribers were increased by 22.7%, while the annual domestic water consumption was increased from 1391 (609–2164) to 3818 (1687–7404) m3/subscriber. The industrial water demands were increased from 56 to 713MCM/year between 1980 and 2009. Following characterization, nonlinear equations were developed to predict the domestic, industrial and agricultural water demands. The predicted water demands were within 1–10% of the historically reported values. The findings might be useful in understanding water sources, water demands and identifying new sources for sustainable water resources management.