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Water resource management using geothermal energy: Eritrea

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Abstract

Eritrea is a country with rich gold, silver and base-metal deposits and geothermal energy resources associated with all the five volcanoes located within the Danakil graben. Due to low rainfall, the country has to depend on imported food and food imports have crossed > 46% in the recent years. Although the cultivable land is about 16,000 km2, only 5030 km2 land is being cultivated due to insufficient water resources. The per capita water requirement is projected to fall below 1300 m3/year from the present 1470 m3/year. The country’s GDP has fallen from 1.3% in 2013 to 0.3% in 2015. Each geothermal province associated with the active volcanoes can support to generate 445 million m3 of desalinated water from the Red Sea. Providing basic needs like water and energy will boost the country’s economy and lift the socio-economic status of 6 million people in the country.

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Acknowledgments

The corresponding author thanks the Director Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad for providing the facilities for this work.

Funding

The authors extend their sincere appreciation to the Deanship of Scientific Research at King Saud University for its funding of this research group no. (ISPP-0099).

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Correspondence to Dornadula Chandrasekharam.

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Chandrasekharam, D., Lashin, A., Al Arifi, N. et al. Water resource management using geothermal energy: Eritrea. Arab J Geosci 11, 523 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-018-3892-9

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