Oil built the Persian Gulf. Desalinated water keeps it alive. War could threaten both

As missiles and drones curtail energy production across the Persian Gulf, analysts warn that water, not oil, may be the resource most at risk in the energy-rich but arid region.

Hundreds of desalination plants line the Persian Gulf coast, putting critical water systems that supply millions within range of Iranian missile or drone strikes. Without these facilities, major cities across the Gulf would be unable to sustain their current populations.

The dependency on desalinated water varies across the region but remains universally critical. In Kuwait, about 90% of drinking water comes from desalination, with Oman relying on the technology for 86% of its supply and Saudi Arabia for roughly 70%. The process removes salt from seawater—most commonly through reverse osmosis, which forces water through ultra-fine membranes—to produce the freshwater that sustains cities, tourism, industry, and agriculture across one of the world’s driest regions.

While global attention has focused primarily on how the Iran conflict might impact energy prices, with the Gulf producing about a third of the world’s crude exports, the region’s water infrastructure faces equally concerning vulnerabilities.

“Everyone thinks of Saudi Arabia and their neighbors as petrostates. But I call them saltwater kingdoms. They’re manmade fossil-fueled water superpowers,” said Michael Christopher Low, director of the Middle East Center at the University of Utah. “It’s both a monumental achievement of the 20th century and a certain kind of vulnerability.”

The vulnerability of these water systems has already been demonstrated in the current conflict. On March 2, Iranian strikes on Dubai’s Jebel Ali port landed approximately 12 miles from one of the world’s largest desalination plants, which produces much of the city’s drinking water. Damage was also reported at the Fujairah F1 power and water complex in the UAE and Kuwait’s Doha West desalination plant, likely resulting from nearby port attacks or debris from intercepted drones.

The risk is compounded by the fact that many Gulf desalination plants operate as co-generation facilities integrated with power stations. This means attacks on electrical infrastructure could simultaneously disrupt water production. Even plants connected to national grids with backup supply routes remain vulnerable to cascading system failures.

“It’s an asymmetrical tactic,” explained David Michel, senior fellow for water security at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “Iran doesn’t have the same capacity to strike back at the United States and Israel. But it does have this possibility to impose costs on the Gulf countries to push them to intervene or call for a cessation of hostilities.”

Desalination plants are complex systems with multiple critical components—from intake systems and treatment facilities to energy supplies—and damage to any part of the chain can halt production. “None of these assets are any more protected than any of the municipal areas that are currently being hit by ballistic missiles or drones,” noted Ed Cullinane, Middle East editor at Global Water Intelligence.

This vulnerability has long been recognized by regional governments and U.S. officials. A 2010 CIA analysis warned that attacks on desalination facilities could trigger national crises in several Gulf states, with prolonged outages potentially lasting months if critical equipment were destroyed. The report highlighted that more than 90% of the Gulf’s desalinated water comes from just 56 plants, each “extremely vulnerable to sabotage or military action.”

A leaked 2008 U.S. diplomatic cable was even more specific, warning that the Saudi capital of Riyadh “would have to evacuate within a week” if either the Jubail desalination plant on the Gulf coast or its associated infrastructure were seriously damaged. Saudi Arabia and the UAE have since invested heavily in pipeline networks, storage reservoirs, and redundancy systems designed to mitigate short-term disruptions, but smaller states like Bahrain, Qatar, and Kuwait have fewer backup options.

The threat is not hypothetical. During Iraq’s 1990-1991 invasion of Kuwait, Iraqi forces sabotaged power stations and desalination facilities as they retreated. Simultaneously, millions of barrels of crude oil were deliberately released into the Persian Gulf, threatening to contaminate seawater intake pipes used by desalination plants across the region. Kuwait was left largely without fresh water and dependent on emergency imports, with full recovery taking years.

More recently, Yemen’s Houthi rebels have targeted Saudi desalination facilities amid regional tensions, part of what Michel describes as “a broader erosion of long-standing norms against attacking civilian infrastructure,” evident in conflicts from Ukraine to Gaza.

Iran itself faces severe water challenges. After a fifth consecutive year of extreme drought, water levels in Tehran’s five reservoirs have plunged to roughly 10% of capacity, prompting President Masoud Pezeshkian to warn the capital may need to be evacuated. Unlike Gulf states, Iran still relies predominantly on rivers, reservoirs, and depleted underground aquifers rather than desalination.

“They were already thinking of evacuating the capital last summer,” noted Cullinane. “I don’t dare to wonder what it’s going to be like this summer under sustained fire, with an ongoing economic catastrophe and a serious water crisis.”