At the end of January, Germany’s Minister of Economic Cooperation and Development Dirk Niebel visited Jordan in the course of a Middle East journey. The German Water Partnership (GWP) was asked to name a delegation of GWP representatives for this part of the journey. Dr. Vestner (Managing Director of Dorsch International) was part of this delegation. The GWP’s target is to establish German expertise and the “Made in Germany” quality worldwide and to strengthen the position of the German water economy in the international markets. Dr. Vestner and Mr. Heidebrecht (DWA) lead the GWP’s regional board Egypt/Jordan.
In addition to numerous official appointments in the Water Ministry of Jordan, the German Embassy and the German-Jordanian University, the schedule also included actual water project sites with German collaboration. At the pump station Baqoria, Mr. Niebel caught up on a pilot project on public-private cooperation for energy saving. A considerable reduction of power consumption and a large increase of the supply rate have been accomplished by alignment optimization, energy efficient pump technology and automated operation. The cornerstone of the project was laid in 2008 by our DI Amman colleagues, who carried through the feasibility study and developed models for the institutional realization in the course of an OMS project.
On the basis of the findings of this pilot project, the Jordanian Water Ministry is working on a nationwide plan for energy efficiency measures in the water sector. The target is to reduce the energy consumption of pump stations and spring conveyance by 25 percent, and thus save about 15 million Euros a year.
