Trouble In Paradise: Dubai Beaches Severely Polluted
November 9th, 2008
With its lavish six-star hotels and glitterati reputation, Dubai has quickly risen to fame as a tourist paradise. But now that fame might be heading towards infamy, as sewage including excrement and the contents of septic tanks has been pouring onto Dubai’s tourist-filled beaches.
Doctors are warning bathers that they run the risk of contracting typhoid and hepatitis, The Jordan Times reports.
How did such a glamourous place come to have such a filthy underbelly?
The answer lies in the development of Dubai itself. The population of Dubai was 1.3 million in 2006, and has rapidly expanded since. But while new apartment blocs and neighborhoods are mushrooming throughout the region, Dubai still has no main drainage system.
Septic tanks are collected and transported to the only waste treatment plant nearby, located in Al Awir in the open desert. This plant is now operating at maximum capacity, so that tanker drivers sometimes have to wait more than 10 hours in the stifling heat, breathing in stinking waste fumes.
The disaster began in September: Some tanker drivers who were sick of waiting started dumped the contents of their tankers into ditches that are intended as run-offs for rain. This dumped waste runs into the sea, and then onto the beaches.
After hearing that 55 tankers had dumped sewage into these runoff ditches, local authorities have issued a heavy fine for waste-dumping and have encouraged drivers to inform on offenders. There is understandable concern among these authorities that when tourists catch wind of this problem, Dubai will lose its allure.
:: The Jordan Times via Mideast Environet
Green Prophet has covered the topic of beach pollution in depth. See some of our previous articles:
Israel Cleans Up its Act and Recycles its Beach Waste
Battle for the Beach
When the Sea Turns Into Our Toilet
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Sometimes we rush toward development without taking into account all of the “externalities,” which are the costs that will be borne by those not specifically involved in the economic project. I am impressed with Dubai’s entrepreneurial spirit, and I think it could serve as a model for the rest of the Arab world. But we have to temper our enthusiasm for growth, with a respect for the environment, and we must factor in all the costs, including those related to environmental degradation, before allowing some of these projects to proceed.
So in this case, for example, the developers should have been forced to calculate some additional costs for additional sewage facilities, before being allowed to build their projects without enough sewage capacity. In the long run, they would have been better off, because a proper sewage system helps protect the viability of their investment, and makes for a much more pleasant swimming experience.
It is a tragedy seeing what Dubai has done to itself. I spent my whole childhood in Dubai and have seen its dramatic changes over the years. It was a wonderful place growing up, with some of the most beautiful beaches in the world. However I can not say the same for it now. It has bought into the idea of the capitalist ‘Modernity’ and as a result has lost touch with its Arab culture, but unfortunately not with its dogmatic restricting ideologies.
It is my fear that the rest of the Arab world will use it as a model for change, as it has absolutely no real civil society at its political base.
It is a major concern that this sewage is being pumped into the water, and residents as well as tourists have been very skeptical about going to the beach recently, especially in JBR (pictured above, which also happens to be where i live).. The authorities have sealed many of these pot holes, only to find them blown back open. This is no doubt, another problem Dubai government will attempt to throw a wad of cash at.. at least this time, it will be a worthy investment..
In the U.S., we have come to believe wholeheartedly in capitalism, because, at least in the past, it has given us, as a nation, wealth and power. And on an individual level, it has given the ordinary citizen an opportunity to climb the ladder of success. We have also seen the failures of socialism and communism and these have further buttressed our abiding belief in our way of life.
However, recent developments have brought into question whether unbridled capitalism is really a good thing. Problems like Global Warming have brought into focus the notion that certain assumptions about our way of life do not always pan out. For example, the decision some 150 years ago to run our economies on fossil fuels may turn out to be one of the greatest blunders in the history of man.
You do want to grow your economy, because it helps you create jobs, and it helps you accumulate wealth, which in turns helps you to give your people a decent quality of life. But you cannot grow in a healthy way without taking environmental concerns into account. There is no point in growing your economy if the growth and your way of life are not sustainable.
Everything we produce should be recycled. There should be no waste. And energy should be clean, realiable, renewable, and affordable. These aspirations are not pie in the sky wishful thinking. They are the foundations of a healthy and sustainable environment which will help assure a quality of life that is real, not illusory, and that takes into account all the consequences of what we choose to do.
Ofcourse we want to develop the economy. I do not have a problem with capitalism per se, but when it becomes the dominating force. Do we really want to end up in an economic downfall as we are now? Where the government is bailing out these mega corporations at our own expense? Why couldn’t we have found this money long ago and to put it to much better use? It is just double standards through and through. We can see that in Dubai quite clearly.
The current crisis points to the Achilles’ Heel of capitalism. People are greedy. And if you let them, their greed will overtake them, and will overtake all other concerns. And yet, as was said in the movie Wall Street, “Greed is good.” It is good because your greed can push you to fight for your piece of the pie, and in that pursuit, you could end up contributing something to the greater good.
So what is the solution? It is OK to allow people to use their sense of greed to achieve more, but you have to channel that drive, with regulation and tax incentives, in ways that are manageable and not destructive. So, for example, you don’t let banks lend money, with no money down, and with no care as to the client’s ability to pay. I built some 1200 houses over the past 30 years, and I was never involved in a foreclosure because you had to put 20% down, and we wouldn’t let you borrow beyond your means.
You’re right to suggest that there is a double standard here. The money could definitely have been put to better use. However, in the fix we’re in, we’re going to do almost anything we can to salvage whatever we can of our financial system, even though we allowed some very greedy people to call the shots in the first place, and to create the mess we’re in.