Desalination: Can We Drink The Ocean?
This video explains how that machine actually works - a membrane fine enough to stop salt, a pump powerful enough to force water through it against its own natural direction, and an energy recovery device that claws back some of the enormous pressure the process needs. It traces the technology back to Sidney Loeb and Srinivasa Sourirajan's 1959 UCLA membrane, proven on real drinking water at Coalinga, California in 1965, and to the Gulf states that boiled seawater by the thermal method for decades before Jeddah's 1978-79 plant proved membrane desalination at scale.
And it covers what happened in September 2026, when a record algae bloom fouled intakes along Israel's coast and knocked five of six desalination plants offline within days - leaving farms and outlying communities without piped water for more than 27 hours, and Tel Aviv cutting beach showers and irrigation, before partial recovery by the end of the month.
The video's real question: did concentrating 80% of a nation's drinking water in six coastal sites free Israel from depending on the weather, or did it just trade one dependency for a narrower one? Israel's answer, a masterplan approved in 2026 to reach 2.3 billion cubic metres of desalinated water a year by 2050 and rehabilitate hundreds of backup boreholes, is only half-built so far - and the video says so.
Educational documentary. Not financial or investment advice.
In these topics
Tags
Chapters
- A Country That Ran Out Of Rain
- Salt Out Of Water: How Reverse Osmosis Works
- The Membrane That Made It Cheap
- From Boiling To Filtering: The Gulf's Earlier Path
- Five Plants, One Coastline
- The Price Of Pressure: Desalination's Energy Bill
- Where The Salt Goes
- What Brine Does To The Seabed
- September 2026: The Algae That Stopped The Taps
- 27 Hours Dry: Who Felt It First
- A Single Point Of Failure By Design
- Engineering The Next Drought
Sources and credits
Photo credits (Wikimedia Commons)
- Sea of Galilee (Lake Tiberias), Israel: unknown, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ASea_of_Galilee.jpg
- Sorek desalination plant, Rishon LeZion, Israel: Office of Senator Kamala Harris, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AKamala_Harris_at_the_Sorek_Desalination_Plant_in_Rishon_Lezion%2C_Israel_24830054958_bcc85e4624_h.jpg
- Nile Delta, Egypt (NASA/USGS satellite view): National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ASatellite_picture_of_the_Nile_Delta%2C_Egypt.jpg
- Nile Delta and Sinai from orbit (ISS wide-angle view): Expedition 35 Crew Image courtesy of the NASA Johnson Space Center, Image Science & Analysis Laboratory Derivative work including grading, noise reduction, lens, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AISS035-E-007148_Nile_-_Sinai_-_Dead_Sea_-_Wide_Angle_View.jpg
- Satellite ocean-colour image of an algae bloom (illustrative example, NOAA/NASA Lake Erie imagery - not the September 2026 Israel bloom itself): Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AToxic_Algae_Bloom_in_Lake_Erie.jpg
- Negev desert agriculture and irrigated fields, Israel: Unknown, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3A125834_negev_agriculture_and_fields_PikiWiki_Israel.jpg
- Tel Aviv beach promenade, Israel: Simon Cobb, CC0 - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ATel_Aviv_Promenade.jpg
Primary sources
- International Arid Lands Consortium (Arizona), 'An Overview of the Role of Desalination in Israel's Water Supply Portfolio', re- - the 2001-2003 drought and 'black line' low point, the 2005 first plant, and the 80-85% current potable-water share.
- Wikipedia, 'Sidney Loeb', re-, corroborated by ScienceDirect's 'A tribute to Sidney Loeb' - the 1959 membrane, 1960 patent filing, and 1965 Coalinga, California demonstration.
- ScienceDirect (Desalination journal), 'The world's first large seawater reverse osmosis desalination plant, at Jeddah, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia', and 'Performance of the 12,000 m3/d seawater reverse osmosis desalination plant at Jeddah' - the 12,000 m3/day capacity, built 1978, on-line January 1979.
- MDPI (Applied Sciences), 'A Review of the Water Desalination Technologies' (2021) - multi-stage-flash thermal desalination in 1950s Kuwait and Qatar, and typical SWRO/MSF energy-per-cubic-metre figures used in chapter 6.
- Haaretz, 'Five of Israel's Six Desalination Plants Shut as Algae Hits Mediterranean Coast', 1 Sep 2026, and 'Algae Levels Drop Along Israel's Coast as Desalination Plants Remain Partially Shut', 28 Sep 2026 - the shutdown's scale and the latest-available recovery status.
- CNN, 'Miles-long microalgae bloom knocks out most of Israel's desalination plants', 4 Sep 2026 - Mekorot's 'a very unusual combination of factors' and the quote from spokesperson Lior Gutman.
- The Times of Israel, 'Desalination plants again shut down due to murky seawater; farmers sound the alarm', 1 Sep 2026 - farmer Shai Swissa's 27-hour water outage and quote.
- NBC News, 'Massive algae bloom exposes fragility of Israel's advanced water system', Sep 2026 - Tel Aviv's beach-shower and irrigation restrictions.
- The Times of Israel, 'New masterplan needed after desalination shutdown underlines dangers of tech overreliance', re- - the 2.3bn m3/yr-by-2050 and 2.75bn m3/yr-by-2075 targets, the 400+200 borehole plan, the actual rehabilitation shortfall, and quotes from Prof. Dror Avisar, Clive Lipchin and David Katz.
Not regulated financial advice.