Bahrain's Environmental Challenges and Sustainability Goals
This paper examines the major environmental challenges facing the Kingdom of Bahrain in the early twenty-first century. Drawing on government reports, international organizations, and academic sources, it surveys six interconnected issues: water scarcity and desalination dependence, air quality degradation from industrial activity, rapid urbanization, vulnerability to sea level rise, and oceanic and coastal pollution driven by petrochemical industries and poor waste management. The paper also highlights key national policy frameworks—the National Action Charter, the Economic Vision 2030, and the National Strategic Master Plan 2030—as well as specific government initiatives designed to address these pressing sustainability concerns.
- Introduction: Bahrain's Sustainability Frameworks: National plans promoting sustainable environmental development
- Water Scarcity and Desalination: Dependence on desalination and wasteful water use
- Air Quality Challenges: Industrial air pollution across Bahrain's cities
- Urbanization and Land Use: Rapid urban growth altering Bahrain's environment
- Sea Level Rise and Coastal Vulnerability: Flooding risks to reclaimed coastal land
- Oceanic and Coastal Pollution: Petrochemical and waste pollution threatening marine ecosystems
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What makes this paper effective
- Organizes a wide range of environmental issues into clearly labeled, parallel sections, making it easy to follow thematic coverage.
- Grounds each claim in cited sources—government reports, NASA data, and peer-reviewed material—giving the survey credibility despite its concise format.
- Connects individual problems to specific policy responses (e.g., the Water Resources Council, the national oil-spill contingency plan), showing awareness of the policy cycle.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates source triangulation: each environmental issue is supported by at least two distinct source types (government statistics, international organizations, academic studies, or satellite imagery analysis), which strengthens the evidentiary base and models good research practice for a survey-style report.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with a brief introduction identifying Bahrain's overarching policy frameworks and lists the six environmental themes to be covered. It then devotes one focused section to each theme—water, air quality, urbanization, sea level rise, and coastal/oceanic pollution—before closing the final section with a note on government mitigation measures. The structure is essentially a thematic inventory rather than a sustained argument, appropriate for a country environmental profile at the undergraduate survey level.
Introduction: Bahrain's Sustainability Frameworks
Bahrain's National Action Charter, the Bahrain Economic Vision 2030, and the National Strategic Master Plan 2030 all promote sustainable economic development. A number of formal governmental and private sector organizations help to inform actual strategies for improving Bahrain's environmental performance. The key issues the Kingdom of Bahrain faces in the early twenty-first century include water access, air pollution, urban development, rising sea levels, ocean pollution from petrochemical industries, and ineffective waste management.
Water Scarcity and Desalination
Until 1925, Bahrain relied on freshwater springs. By the 1980s, almost all of those freshwater sources had ceased flowing, and the Kingdom now relies on "non-conventional sources of water," namely desalination (Bahrain Economic Development Board, 2017). Bahrain has four desalination plants. Nevertheless, Bahrain has a poor water consumption ratio and is ranked as the second most wasteful water user in the world, measured in water consumed per square centimeter of land (Bahrain Economic Development Board, 2017). To address problems with water scarcity and water management, the government of Bahrain has established the Water Resources Council.
Air Quality Challenges
Bahrain's air quality is moderate in most areas. Its capital and largest city, Manama, has a rating of 87 on the air quality index, which is at the upper level of the moderate range ("Air Pollution in Bahrain: Real-time Air Quality Index Visual Map," n.d.). However, IAMAT (2016) points out that the North Sitra Industrial Area, Hamad Town, Hidd, Ma'ameer, Nabih Saleh, and Nabih Saleh all have poor air quality due to excessively high levels of particulate matter from desalination plants and petrochemical industries. By at least one measure, Bahrain ranks among the ten worst countries in the world for air pollution (Pantsios, 2014).
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