LONDON: Work on the longest desalinated water pipeline tunnel system in the world has been completed, project coordinators in Saudi Arabia announced on Friday.
The tunnel, which measures 12.5 kilometers long at a width of 8.4 meters, will pump desalinated water to reservoirs in Taif to meet the demand for water in the governorate and in its villages in the southern Al-Baha region.
The project, carried out by the Kingdom’s Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC), took 19 months to complete — starting with excavation work at Al-Hada mountains — and has shortened the distance of water reaching Taif by more than 40km.
Makkah region officials tweeted about the completion of the project, which was completed ahead of schedule.
SWCC said it was ready to receive water in its storage units in Taif and estimate that desalinated water will begin reaching Al-Baha region in the third quarter of 2021.