Five years have passed since the Israeli government published its first large seawater desalination plant tender for the Ashkelon 50 million m3/year BOT project, which served as the main theme of the 2nd Israel Desalination Society (IDS) Annual Conference. Since then three other major tenders have been issued:
• Up-to-65-million m3/year government sponsored multiple BOO projects;
• Ashdod 45-million m3/year Mekorot sponsored turnkey project;
• 100-million m3/year government sponsored and partially financed BOT project at Hadera.
The 7th annual conference of the Israel Desalination Society will review the main requirements of the tenders and projects, their logic and consequences, and the current status of all projects and their projected timetables. The conference will address the future needs of additional large scale desalination plants, focusing on forecasted needs versus programmed tenders. The program, geared mainly to the Israeli experience, also includes presentations of some overseas BOOT projects. A concluding panel session will discuss the lessons gained, the problems and concerns raised in the conference and possible solutions for improving future tenders.
The IDS organized the event under the auspices of the Grand Water Research Institute of the Technion and the Zuckerberg Institute for Water Research of the Ben-Gurion University. The conference will be held in Tel-Aviv at the Israel Trade Fairs & Convention Center.
