CANARY ISLANDS, A PARADISE ON LIFE SUPPORT

Sixty years after the first desalination plant was built, the Canary Islands have become the region with the highest number of desalination plants per square meter per capita in the world. Although essential to human life on these volcanic lands, this desalinated water has also fueled rapid economic development: mass tourism, intensive monoculture banana farming for export, etc.

But producing this fresh water is not without consequences: massive use of oil to generate the energy needed for desalination, brine discharges that destroy marine life and acidify the oceans…

Canaries islands, a paradise on life support is a groundbreaking investigation into a region of the world that has become utterly dependent on desalinated water!
The film seeks to understand desalination and how it works, and to assess the consequences of this process and its use. Aware of the urgent need to preserve their land and their health and to secure their children’s future, citizens and researchers are rolling up their sleeves and implementing alternatives to save water and change how it is used.

The Canary Islands’ experience with desalination allows us to explore the ins and outs of this rapidly expanding technology around the world. With the severe droughts we are already experiencing, the use of desalinated water concerns us all, or will concern us all, one day.

Initial broadcasts on Arte
© ARTE France – Big Company Prod 2024
A movie directed by Yoann Périé and written by Yoann Périé and Alice Roy.
With the support of the CNC, Procirep/Angoa and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes