In 2010, the
Nimr Reed Beds program was born over this new identified soil area on this rocky barren desert.
The wetland created by the plantation of more than 1.2 million seedlings by PDO is now a desert habitat for close to 100 species of birds (sand martins, wagtails, flamingos...) as well as insects, fish and small reptiles.
A wetland formed by the reeds themselves is now covering around 2.4 million square metres of previously arid desert.
The site is now currently treating more than 700,000 barrels of produced water a day.
This results in a
colossal saving in energy consumption if we compare it to the conventional, energy-consuming disposal method of pumping the water under high pressure more than 1.5 km below ground into deep aquifers.
This project, which has won multiple awards, is widely known in the world’s oil and gas sector as one of the
most innovative environmentally friendly schemes.