Cyprus’s Cabinet today updated its desalination planning and approved three new Permanent Desalination Units, as part of a series of decisions taken since 2024 to strengthen the country’s water balance and secure its water supply.
The update follows progress on existing projects and a reassessment of the country’s water needs, and forms part of a broader, long-term plan to significantly strengthen water security and gradually reduce reliance on rainfall and dam reserves.
The three new units will be built in Dhekelia, with a capacity of 80,000 cubic metres a day, in Ayia Thekla, with a capacity of 30,000 cubic metres a day, and in Polis Chrysochous, with a capacity of 10,000 cubic metres a day, provided all the necessary approvals and licences are secured.
The three units will move forward alongside the new Permanent Desalination Unit for East Limassol, with a capacity of 60,000 cubic metres a day, which has already been approved. Together, the four new units will have a combined capacity of 180,000 cubic metres of water a day.
As part of a reassessment of projects that had been planned as emergency measures against water shortages, the Cabinet decided to cancel the Mobile Desalination Unit in Ayia Napa, which will be replaced in the planning by the new permanent unit in Ayia Thekla. It also decided to postpone the Floating Desalination Unit in Germasogeia, with its necessity to be reviewed at a later date based on water needs, reserves and economic cost.
The Cabinet also decided to proceed with the Six-Year Desalination Plan for 2025-2031, and, in principle, with a Long-Term Desalination Plan to cover the country’s water supply needs until 2050.
As part of the long-term planning, the Water Development Department is also preparing a Strategic Sustainability Study of Desalination Projects, which will examine, as a baseline scenario, whether 100 per cent of the country’s water supply needs could be met with desalinated water. Final decisions on the Long-Term Plan will be based on the study’s conclusions.
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