“With all due sarcasm, I have to thank the Ministry of Energy and the Water Authority for giving me the only motivation I have to go to the gym every day…to take a shower.” With this biting remark, a Beirut resident summed up his daily struggle with the water crisis on social media. While citizens look for gyms to bathe in, the owner of a water tanker tells the story of a parallel sector that has become part of the capital’s life since the 1970s: “I cover Achrafieh and Gemmayzeh… usually I run four pickups. Today only one worked, because yesterday the state supplied water to the households, but today there’s nothing to do. I’ll just lay my head down and sleep.”
According to Lebanon’s national water strategy, each individual needs about 200 liters of water daily. The Water Law guarantees every human the right to sufficient water for their needs, in exchange for paying subscription fees for its use.
Despite this, the state does not provide the service regularly. In theory, the official infrastructure network is supposed to supply each household in Beirut with one cubic meter of water daily, for an annual subscription of 16,170,000 LBP (about 180 USD). But in practice, water only flows for a few hours at a time, far too little to meet actual needs. As a result, residents rely on water tankers as a secondary source, with costs varying by area and circumstance.
Former head of the water tankers’ union and current head of the Beirut and Mount Lebanon Water Authority, Rabih Khalifeh, explained in an interview with Daraj that “the water problem is chronic and extends beyond the capital. It goes back essentially to the lack of infrastructure development after the civil war to keep pace with population growth and human needs. That is what drove demand for alternative sources like tankers.”
Beirut and Mount Lebanon’s water authority supplies the capital from two main sources: the water treatment plant in Dbayeh north of the city, and wells in Damour to the south. “Dbayeh usually produces around 200,000 cubic meters of water daily, but during this exceptional year, production has dropped to about 70,000 cubic meters only,” Khalifeh said. He added: “There are around 10–15 wells in Damour that supply part of the capital’s needs.”
On distribution schedules in Beirut, Khalifeh noted they “differ from one area to another, as water cannot be pumped to the entire capital at once.” He stressed that schedules are “directly affected by power cuts, which disrupt regular pumping.” All available resources, he said, are currently being mobilized to address the crisis, alongside ongoing work to rehabilitate the Jeita Canal that feeds Beirut.
Minister of Energy and Water Joe Sadi sent letters to the water authorities demanding full transparency and fairness in setting up water distribution schedules and announcing them regularly to citizens. But these schedules have not been posted on the authority’s website or social media pages.
Attorney Ali Abbas finally obtained the August 2025 distribution schedules after the Beirut and Mount Lebanon Water Authority had previously refused to hand them over, despite his formal request in June and the expiration of legal deadlines.
In an interview with Daraj, Abbas stressed “the necessity of transparency in showing the mechanism for distribution, based on citizens’ right to access information. This has nothing to do with national security or special secrecy. It should be published on the official websites and platforms of the water authorities.”
The schedules reveal clear inequality: some neighborhoods get around five hours of water supply every three days, while others receive no more than three and a half. Meanwhile, in one Mount Lebanon area, supply reaches 24 hours a day.
Even with schedules in place, Beirut residents complain online that they are inaccurate: “There’s a schedule, sure, but where’s the water? We’ve been buying for four months straight.”
Water on the Black Market
On social media, one user wrote: “In Beirut, water is cut off not because there isn’t any, but because there’s a mafia. Tankers are more common on the streets than taxis, and prices fluctuate daily like a stock exchange. Citizens now have to chase water the way they chase electricity.”
Another added: “In every country, people pay the state for a service they actually receive. Except in Lebanon; we pay, and every year they rudely raise the price for a phantom service.” A third vented angrily: “What’s the solution with the water meters we pay for in vain? We’ve reported it twice through the hotline and filed a request with no result. All that matters is that the citizen keeps on paying, right?”
Beirut’s water crisis is part of a wider network of interconnected interests that has established a parallel economy providing steady income to those with influence. With water missing from official networks, tankers now roam the capital as if they were a normal service, becoming a familiar part of residents’ daily lives.
Lawyer Ali Abbas explains: “The water crisis in Beirut is similar to the story of generators and other substitute sectors that were imposed on citizens, forcing them to pay double bills just to access basic services.” He added that the crisis is “part of an organized network whose aim is to weaken state institutions in order to create a parallel economy, protected and divided among power brokers across areas of influence: one monopolizes the tankers, another the generators, another satellite TV or internet.”
This network profits from a deteriorating system that has made Beirut one of the world’s worst cities in water management, with waste rates reaching 40 percent. Abbas stressed: “The tanker companies we see on the market are only front names. Behind them stand political figures who use the sector as a key source of income for their parties, a steady pipeline of funding and influence.”
“We Have No Authority Over the Tankers”
According to Law 192/2020 amending the 2018 Water Law, no one may extract groundwater—whether by drilling artesian wells or other means—without prior authorization or a license from the Ministry of Energy and Water. Yet, according to the World Bank, the total number of licensed private wells in Greater Beirut and Mount Lebanon is about 20,000, while another 60,000 wells operate illegally.
The head of the Beirut and Mount Lebanon Water Authority explained: “The Authority has no direct authority over tankers if they are filling from private wells or springs, unless it is proven they are stealing water belonging to the Authority, in which case it is considered a serious crime and we take immediate action.” He added that some tankers may indeed be filling from illegal wells, “but the competent authority to handle these cases is the security services and the judiciary.”
This conflict of interest is glaring: the former head of the tanker union currently heads the Beirut and Mount Lebanon Water Authority itself. This raises serious questions about the institution’s neutrality and its ability to manage the water sector free from the influence of those profiting off the tanker crisis.
Such overlap between official positions and the parallel sector transforms tankers from a temporary fix into a permanent business, eroding public trust in the state and its institutions. How can a public authority meant to regulate and secure the service be led by someone formerly tied to the tanker sector benefitting from the crisis?
The Water Cartel
The tanker sector, worth millions of dollars annually, is built on cash transactions, leaving it effectively outside the tax system. As such, profits flow untaxed and unmonitored, turning the tanker trade into a parallel economy entirely beyond state accountability.
A tanker owner told Daraj about the volume of money circulating in the trade, saying that some major distributors own between 80 and 100 tankers. But the biggest beneficiary is the well owner: “The guy with the well makes more money than we do. He can make $1,000–$1,500 a day just sitting there.”
Access to the well meant for filling water, known as “the na‘oura”, has a fixed price: “We arrive at the well and pay the owner $15 per 5,000 liters. We then resell it for $40–50,” a tanker owner explained. He owns six pickup trucks, each carrying water about 10 times a day, covering 70–80 households daily.
Prices are set arbitrarily, as each tanker owner determines their own pricing. As one tanker owner explained: “If you call me for 1,000 liters, I’ll get to you in half an hour. But if someone else calls for 5,000 liters, I’ll leave you and go to him because it pays more.”
All the tanker owners Daraj spoke to clarified that prices vary depending on three main factors: the quantity ordered, the building’s floor height, and the distance from the well. One operator said: “On the ground floor, we charge between 700,000 and 1.4 million LBP for 10 barrels. If it’s above the 7th floor, the price jumps to $30.” Another explained: “If the well is nearby, like in Dekwaneh, it’s $50 for a tanker of about 100 barrels, but it goes up $10 if it’s farther away.” Another added: “At lower floors, 10 barrels cost 1.4 million LBP (around $15). On the rooftop, it’s about 3 million LBP (around $33).”
One of the tank owners also noted the surge in tankers lining up at wells: “We used to see 4 or 5 trucks a day. Now 30 or 40 pickups enter at the same time.” Some tankers, he said, deliver salty water from coastal wells in Karantina; others distribute contaminated water to citizens.
Is Groundwater only Reserved for Tankers?
Although tanker owners mainly rely on filling water from underground wells, questions remain as to why the Beirut and Mount Lebanon Water Authority does not officially invest in these resources to supply citizens. Hydrogeologist Samir Zaatiti explained in an interview with Daraj that “Beirut can be supplied with groundwater just like the cities of Saida, Tyre, Nabatieh, and Marjayoun.” He noted that the hard, fractured carbonate reservoirs, which melt in rainwater and are scientifically known as karst aquifers, surround the capital and hold a significant renewable water reserve. He pointed to suitable geological and hydrogeological sites near Beirut, adding: “The areas of Wadi Shahrour–Kfarchima and Jisr al-Qadi–Damour are among the richest in renewable groundwater annually.” He asked why the state does not drill wells, treat the water, and pipe it directly into homes.
In response, the head of the Beirut and Mount Lebanon Water Authority argued that “the project to channel water from the Awali River to Beirut is the most important, more important than any investment in wells, because it secures massive quantities of water for the capital. It is currently under construction.”
Yet the fundamental problem remains that new projects are still being built on old, decaying networks, raising doubts about their effectiveness. Khalifeh explained: “We have ongoing workshops to repair the networks, but we cannot claim we will replace all of Beirut’s network at once. The new approach is the District Meter Area (DMA): selecting a defined area, installing meters to measure distributed water against subscriptions, which allows us to detect leaks and pinpoint wastage.” He noted that this model “is currently being piloted in the Municipal Stadium area of the capital, with results to guide further development for the remainder of the networks.”
Zaatiti described this approach as “a policy of preparing containers without water.” He recalled recommendations made by the German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR), commissioned in 2014 by the Council for Development and Reconstruction, the Beirut Water Authority, and the Ministry of Energy and Water, to study the Jeita Spring. The BGR report estimated that around 30 percent of the water transported between Jeita and the Dbayeh plant is lost due to leakage. The main tunnel could carry no more than 3.1 cubic meters per second. BGR recommended building two additional pipelines between Jeita and Dbayeh to ensure continuity if the main line failed—saving around 7 million cubic meters annually—reducing network leakage in Beirut, and constructing a dam at Daraya with a capacity of 9 million cubic meters to offset shortages during dry periods.
While Zaatiti insists that groundwater reserves could supply the capital, a tanker owner interviewed by Daraj countered: “There is no real water crisis in Beirut. The state could secure people’s needs with the same groundwater that is now used to fill tankers.” He added: “Just two areas in Beirut could supply half of Beirut with fresh water. In Achrafieh alone, there are four wells producing around 4,000 tons a day. If the state seized them and redistributed them, that would be enough for half the city.”
He continued: “Five wells each generate $1,000–1,500 daily; that’s $750,000–800,000 a month. If the state took them over, people would get water from their taps instead of buying it from tankers.”
And so, every morning, Beirutis wake up to the roar of tanker trucks, while underground aquifers overflow beneath them. The tanker sector thrives, turning water from a basic right into a black-market commodity, proving that the crisis is not one of scarcity, but of mismanagement.
