The concept of drip irrigation has been well known for decades. After WWII
plastics technology took off rapidly and drip irrigation became economically
practical. The first such work was with micro-tubes and took place in
England and France in greenhouses. About 1960, a Mr.Symcha Blass an employee
of a British Water Agency, emigrated to Israel. There is a "fable" (which
could be true, because it came from his own mouth) about Symcha Blass
sitting next to a tree which was near a leaking faucet and Eureka! But there
is also no doubt that he knew about the British greenhouse application of
micro-tubes. With the desperate water shortage in Israel, he decided that
this technology would be useful for growing crops in the field as well as in
greenhouses. The microtube was first wrapped around the feeding tube to keep
it out of the way to prevent damage. This was followed by a molded coupling,
with the spiral molded in. In turn this developed into the ubiquitous two
piece in-line dripper described in Blass' patent. Blass did his work at
Kibbutz Hatzerim and formed the basis of the Netafim, irrigation enterprise,
whose annual exports lately exceed $350m.
Modern drip irrigation has arguably become the most important innovation in
agriculture since the invention of the impact sprinkler in the 1930s, which
had replaced wasteful flood irrigation. Drip irrigation may also use devices
called micro-spray heads, which spray water in a small area, instead of
dripping emitters. These are generally used on tree and vine crops with
wider root zones. Subsurface drip irrigation or SDI uses a permanently or
temporarily buried dripperline or drip tape located at or below the plant
roots. It is becoming more extensively used for row crop irrigation
especially in areas where water supplies are limited or recycled water is
used for irrigation.Simple in concept and execution water is small amounts
directed by small water pipes that aim directly at the root of a
plant.Fertigation came next. It allowed fertilizers to be added to the
water. These simple systems were exported throughout the world and earned
hundreds of millions of dollars in exports for Israel.
Israeli Jaffa oranges and grapefruits were also well accepted
internationally but total annual sales were in the order of several hundreds
of millions of dollar.Over the years citrus growing declined and most
orchards were shut down.
While the water problem grew, at the same time desalination expertise was
being developed. One executive told me that the Zarchin process desalination
plant was operating in more than 50 countries but only one in Israel
The Israel Sea Water Conversion Commission has been experimenting with
desalting technology for years. Two desalination plants have been built on
the Red Sea at Elath. One is an oil-fired, dual-purpose distillation plant,
producing 1,125,000 gallons of fresh water a day and 6,000 kilowatts of
electricity. The same steam that turns the turbine generators supplies the
heat that evaporates fresh water from the brine. The second and smaller
plant -- 265,000-gallons-a-day -- separates salt from water by a vacuum
freezing process developed by the 75-year-old Israeli engineer, Alexander
Zarchin.
The Zarchin process is based on the principle that as seawater is frozen,
the growth of ice crystals expels the salt and other impurities. A salt
water film that coats the otherwise pure ice crystals is washed off, and the
ice is melted. Zarchin believes his process is the most efficient because
the energy needed to freeze water is one-seventh that required to boil an
equivalent amount for distillation.
However things are changing. Irael Desalination Engineering (IDE) plans to
raise up tos $200 million at a company value of $500 million, before money,
on the London Stock Exchange.
IDE was founded in 1965. The company develops both thermal and seawater
reverse osmosis desalination - the two prevailing technologies for seawater
desalination, and is active in 40 countries.
In this issue we feature the recently held Water 2007 Conference as well as
other developments. We believe `that Israel's water industry will expand
rapidly.
For most of its existence Israeli agriculture has been known primarily for
its drip water irrigation.. Drip irrigation, is also known as trickle
irrigation or microirrigation an irrigation method that minimizes the use of
water and fertilizer, by allowing water to seep slowly to the roots of
plants, either onto the soil surface or directly onto the root zone, through
a network of valves, pipes, tubing, and emitters.