Four years ago, my friends and I hiked in 100-degree weather through Ein Gedi while stopping to swim at little ponds of natural springs throughout the hike. We crossed the street to the Dead Sea, stuck our toes in the warm, salty water, and then decided that the Sea was too hot and we were too tired to swim (float). Today, the road by Ein Gedi that we crossed is closed and is partially sunken into the ground. The beach that we visited is about fifteen feet away from the Dead Sea’s shoreline, and likewise, is closed. The Dead Sea is dying.
Pictured above: the Dead Sea in 2014 (L) and in 2018 (R)
On the Arava Institute’s water trip, we visited Mineral Beach, one of the Dead Sea’s closed beaches, and walked dangerously close to a large sinkhole. We were told that Israel estimates that there are about 6,000 sinkholes on the Israeli side of the Dead Sea, and the Dead Sea’s shoreline recedes about three feet a year. Mineral Beach was abandoned, dilapidated, and sinking. We stood on the edge of a growing sinkhole that engulfs part of the parking lot. The shoreline was many feet away, and “no lifeguard” warning signs lay abandoned in the dirt. Looking at Mineral Beach is how I imagine viewing human-created infrastructure after an apocalyptic event.
The Dead Sea is receding largely due to the disparity between water flow into the Sea and water evaporation rates. One billion cubic meters of water a year evaporates from the Dead Sea, and previously, one billion cubic meters of water entered the Dead Sea from the Jordan River each year. However, because of water scarcity and water demand in the region, Israel and Jordan extract a lot of water from the Jordan River, and today, about 100 million cubic meters enters the Dead Sea. When the shoreline recedes, a hydrologic process (that I don’t quite understand) occurs between the salt and the groundwater aquifer, leading to the creation of sinkholes along the shoreline.
How can the Dead Sea be saved? The answer is that it is complicated and costly. There is a proposed Red Sea-Dead Sea project, which involves building a one-billion-cubic-meter desalination facility in Jordan (ten times the largest desalination plant, which happens to be in Israel). Jordan, the second most water-scarce country in the world, will receive the desalinated water and the brine-y water will be pumped from the Red Sea to the Dead Sea.
However, this project is very complicated. It’s expensive, requires transboundary cooperation between Israel and Jordan, is of extraordinary scale, and at the end of the day, the project may change the water chemistry of the Dead Sea, which may exacerbate the sinkhole problem. There is a smaller scale Phase I project of the Red Sea-Dead Sea project, but there are complications with that as well. Most likely, nothing will happen in the next few years.
The Dead Sea is the first major geologic formation that I feel like I will see meet its death in my own lifetime. I do not believe that there will be a Dead Sea to share with my kids. It is a shame that the lowest point on Earth, the sea that you can float in, will just be a wasteland of sink holes.
Thinker deeper about the issue, I think it also comes down to my belief in hope for the region. Like I said, I do not think the Dead Sea will exist by the end of my lifetime, or at least exist in the way that I saw it four years ago. Likewise, I think that peace is very, very, very complicated and is not achievable with the current political landscape in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, and with the international players. I came to the Arava Institute to hope, but sometimes the more I learn and the more I discuss, the more complicated the picture becomes and the more hopeless I feel. The question for me is how to hope and how to create positive change in circumstances that seem increasingly hopeless.
