The Globes reports that the Israel Chemicals Ltd. has announced that the High Court of Justice rejected petitions filed by the Israel Union for Environmental Defense and the Movement for Quality Government in Israel against Israel Chemicals subsidiary Dead Sea Works, the Israeli government and the Ministry of Finance over the government’s decision on a permanent solution for the water level in the Dead Sea’s southern basin and royalties that Israel Chemicals will pay the government for mining Dead Sea minerals.

The estimate cost of the salt harvesting project in the southern basin of the Dead Sea is estimated at NIS 3.8 billion through 2030. The project aims to solve the problem of the rising water level in pool 5 of the basin, which risks flooding the shorefront hotels at Ein Bokek.

The water level in pool 5 is rising by 20 centimeters a year, due to the precipitation of salts, produced by Israel Chemicals’ mining operations, on the seabed.

Data presented by Israel Chemicals in the past state that most of the cost of the salt harvesting project is for building the complicated infrastructures, which it estimates at NIS 2.2 billion.

These costs include the procurement of three dredges, which will harvest the salt on pool 5’s seabed, and a conveyor belt to carry the harvested salt 36 kilometers from pool 5 to the dumping point in the Dead Sea’s northern basin.

Dredging Today Staff, May 29, 2012;