Many Arab countries suffer from a shortage in power generation, especially at peak times during the summer, when air-conditioning use soars. Also, consumers often suffer from sudden or frequent power cuts, despite the fact that nearly 600 billion dollars were invested in the power sector in the Arab world between 2000 and 2009, according to the comprehensive report presented by the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development (AFESD) at the ninth Arab Energy Conference. The overall peak load in Arab countries at the end of 2009 was found to stand at approximately 140 million kilowatts, while the overall consumption during the same year was 653 thousand gigawatt-hours The reasons for power cuts differ from one country to another. They are either due to a lack of investments in a given country, a temporary technical fault, mismanagement, a shortage of fuel to operate the plants, or are a result of sabotaged transmission lines and equipment. But whatever the reasons may be, this is causing people to suffer, as power has become a basic part of their lives, not to mention the enormous losses to the economies of these countries. According to AFESD, Arab demand for power will continue to rise at the current rate during the next 10 years, and is estimated to reach 2984 thousand megawatt-hours in 2020, while peak load is expected to rise to 287 gigawatt-hours in 2020. As a result of this load, new power plants are expected to be built between 2010 and 2020, with a combined capacity of about 200 gigawatts. Also, the estimated investment costs for the construction of new power plants and for the required upgrading of the transmission and distribution networks stand at about 300 billion dollars, according to AFESD's estimates. The reasons behind the increase in consumption include population growth, rising standard of living, failure to build the required number of power stations in the past years, in addition to wasteful and excessive consumption of power. The Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development has been working on and investing for years in the Arab electric interconnection project, which is being carried out in stages including feasibility studies, negotiations and then execution. The project still has many stages to go through before completion, according to Engineer Samir Qotob who presented the report to the conference. In truth, electric interconnection among the Arab countries is an important means of achieving electric energy savings. In addition, it contributes to strengthening one of the most fundamental components of cooperation among Arab countries. The feasibility studies for Arab electric interconnection began in the eighties, and were granted five million dollars by the AFESD, while the total amount of loans provided by this fund to finance these interconnection projects amounted to 800 million dollars, or one-third of the completed interconnection projects' costs. These projects were executed through regional interconnection frameworks, such as the Eight Linkage Project, which aims at providing electric linkage for the grids of Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Palestine, Syria and Turkey. This project began as a Five Linkage Project for Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Syria and Turkey, then became a six linkage project when Lebanon joined by linking its grid to that of Syria. Then, Libya and Palestine joined into form what has become an Eight Linkage Project. In 1998, the Egyptian-Libyan and the Egyptian-Jordanian interconnections were put in operation. In 2009, the Syrian-Lebanese interconnection was also activated. It is also expected that the transmission lines connecting Iraq to Syria and Turkey will be completed in the near future. Since water security is at the top of economic and social challenges facing the countries of the region, we hope that the AFESD will also prioritize water interconnections among Arab countries in parallel with electric interconnection. *. Mr. Khadduri is an energy expert
