An-Najah Staff

The majority of operation and maintenance challenges in building projects are attributed to the decisions made during the design phase. The timely involvement of the maintenance team in the design development and review stages provides a potential for reducing maintainability problems during the functional life of buildings. This paper identifies and assesses the significant water supply and drainage systems’ design defects that commonly occur in the building projects in Saudi Arabia as a consequence of the lack of maintenance feedback to the design team. These defects were identified based on knowledge from the published literature and professional practice. The research reported in this paper endorsed the importance of all the recognized defects based on the appraisal of the executives of the campus maintenance departments in the 13 public Saudi Arabian universities renowned for operating and maintaining substantial building stock. The paper then presents a series of validated maintainability design review checklists by the survey participants, derived to reduce the occurrence of the identified defects. These checklists are available for consideration by design professionals at two main design completion stages, i.e., (1) 60%, and (2) 90%. This paper is of practical value to design professionals aiming to design maintainable building projects, and maintenance managers striving to provide the most efficient level of service to occupants and property owners.

Middle Eastern countries (ME) are expected to face severe water shortages in the near future. As most conventional water resources are already developed or over exploited, there is a need to develop non-conventional options to bridge water shortages. These options include brackish and sea-water desalination and fresh water imports from outside the region either by sea or land. Technically, non-conventional options are possible and feasible, however, depending on many factors, these options are available at a high capital investment with different costs and are associated with some environmental and ecological impacts and political considerations. Water and other conflicts in the region along with funding problems are the main obstacles to the implementation of such options in the ME. Integrating conventional and non-conventional water development options are found to be a more viable combination on the long term. Cooperation between ME countries is found to be a key factor to overcoming water shortage using non-conventional options. Therefore, it is concluded that non-conventional water options should be encouraged in the region and should be utilized to overcome not only water shortages but also to resolve conflicts and restore economic growth, peace, and stability among regional parties and people.

The increase in demand for the limited raw water resources in the Palestinian Territories has led to the proposals for use of treated wastewater as one alternative for alleviating water shortages and for optimizing the use of water resources. Wastewater reuse is a multi-discipline and important element of water resources development. Wastewater usage releases high quality water for drinking and other purposes. Quantitative, economic, and social aspects related to wastewater reuse in the West Bank are discussed. Through analyses of the estimated cost and expected water quantities, the paper investigates the economic feasibility of wastewater reuse. Social acceptance is elicited by means of questionnaires, which have been applied to farmers and inhabitants in different areas of the West Bank. Wastewater reuse can compensate for about 10 percent of irrigated agriculture, which contributes 35 percent of the total value of the Palestinian agricultural sector. The paper presents an analysis of the main aspects of wastewater reuse and defines an approach to the beneficial use of wastewater as a component that should be considered in the strategy for the overall management of water resources in the Palestinian Territories.

Middle Eastern countries (ME) are expected to face severe water shortages in the near future. As most conventional water resources are already developed or over exploited, there is a need to develop non-conventional options to bridge water shortages. These options include brackish and sea-water desalination and fresh water imports from outside the region either by sea or land. Technically, non-conventional options are possible and feasible, however, depending on many factors, these options are available at a high capital investment with different costs and are associated with some environmental and ecological impacts and political considerations. Water and other conflicts in the region along with funding problems are the main obstacles to the implementation of such options in the ME. Integrating conventional and non-conventional water development options are found to be a more viable combination on the long term. Cooperation between ME countries is found to be a key factor to overcoming water shortage using non-conventional options. Therefore, it is concluded that non-conventional water options should be encouraged in the region and should be utilized to overcome not only water shortages but also to resolve conflicts and restore economic growth, peace, and stability among regional parties and people.