Shipping Water Via Water

Finland's largest waterworks Helsingin Vesi is investigating shipping water to the United Arab Emirates, after it had been approached by a consultancy firm hired by the UAE to deliver up to 450,000 cu. m. of water a day to the Gulf state. "If we had the permit to sell water, we could transfer reasonable amounts even quite soon," Korelin said. Although 450,000 cu. m. would be too big an amount to export, there was sufficient extra capacity to meet part of the demand." He said the company would first have to address legal and logistical problems posed by water exports.

"We have to do some kind of a investigation in this issue and go through both legal and technical matters," Korelin said. He said the company would also have to discuss the sale with city officials as the company is owned by the city of Helsinki. Helsingin Vesi supplies around 200,000 cu. m. of water a day to Helsinki residents and nearby towns. He also said there had been no discussion on how much the water would cost if it was sold outside Finland. The pre-tax price of water in Helsinki is 2.15 markka ($0.34) per liter. "We have not even thought of a price," Korelin said. He said, however, that a Finnish shipping company had already shown interest in the possible project.