The ostensible Sahara desert, and the water in its interior, has become the main source of drinking water for Libyans, with water extracted from its hollow.
More than 630 wells emanate from them, transporting through pipes spanning thousands of kilometres to large reservoirs, through the industrial river network, reaching agricultural land and cities in northern Libya, such as Benghazi, Tripoli and some of the cities of Jabal Nafusa.¸
The Industrial River Project achieved a 100% completion rate in the first and second phases. In the third phase, the completion rate was 80% to feed the cities of the western part of Libya from Ghadams to Zawara.
The Industrial River is now Libya’s first water resource at 70%, and the River Project Management believes it will continue to provide water for thousands of years.
Ahmed Adib, Chairman of the Industrial River Apparatus Management Committee, “Mathematical models were conducted through the Joint Expertise Houses with the Industrial River Apparatus, and all of these reservoirs were found to have tremendous water potential up to thousands of years old.
Approximately 3,000 Libyan workers are pumping 3.5 million cubic metres of water a day into cities, but due to infringements on wells and supply lines, this capacity has dropped to 2 million cubic metres a day, prompting the security services to campaign against saboteurs.
Ali al-Habashi, Director of the Operation and Maintenance Department of the River System, Gharyan Branch, stated: “The breakdowns in the industrial river as a result of illegal attacks and connections, caused many technical problems for the valves, and required a great effort from engineers and engineers. Professionals
Abdullah Adib, a pioneer in the agricultural police, said: “The theft of fuses and illegal connections, caused corruption, I mean the theft of the reservoir, the theft of fuses and doors, the entire headquarters was stolen by militias, and after we were tasked with running out of law and the river apparatus, the attacks were terminated from Tarhuna to the mainland, and the saboteans were seized and handed over to the prosecution.”
The industrial river not only pumped water into cities, but also agricultural land, where thousands of hectares were reclaimed. River water is also used to irrigate agricultural crops by distilling to conserve water.
Groundwater was discovered in the Sahara during oil exploration by some American companies, and some specialists believe that groundwater was collected subsoil nearly 4,000 years ago.
This contributed to the establishment of the industrial river several international companies, where the executing company was Korean, while bringing pumps and machinery from the factories of German companies, and the executing company continued to operate the project and train Libyans to work for two years before the project was delivered to its management by them.
The industrial river is designed to transport 6 million cubic meters of water per day, 60% of which is used for agricultural projects, 30% for drinking water, and 10% for industrial projects, but the population density in some cities has made the use of most water for drinking.
The river project was interrupted after the 2011 people’s uprising in Libya, after the completion of the first phase of the river project, It is the transfer of water from the bedsit area to the cities of northeastern Libya Water Transfer “, such as Ajdabia and Benghazi, while the 80% of Phase II was completed, namely, the transfer of water from the Hassanah wells to the western cities of Libya including Misrata, Tripoli, Tarhouna, Beni Walid and Jebel Nafousa, Rehabilitating the second phase recently, water reached Kakkala City for the first time this year.