The European Bank for Reconstruction & Development (EBRD) tendered a feasibility study for the third phase of Al-Samra Wastewater Treatment Plant with a deadline in March 2015.

The winning team of consultants will carry out technical, financial, legal, environmental studies.

EBRD is considering financing and providing support for the proposed expansion, which will increase the plant’s capacity by 100,000 to 145,000 cubic metres a day (cm/d).

It was originally planned to be commissioned in 2025 but will now have to be brought forward to meet higher than expected demand.

Syrian refugees in Jordan officially number 628,427 but the actual number is probably higher due to unregistered refugees living outside camps. They are putting acute stress on already scarce water supplies in northern Jordan.

The current 97,000 cm/d expansion is being developed by a consortium led by French Degremont under a 25 year build-operate-transfer (BOT) contract.

It will bring the capacity to 365,000cm/d when it is completed in mid-2015.

The project has a total cost of $225m, of which $93m is a grant from the US government’s Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC). France’s Suez Environment, the US’ Infilco Degremont and the US’ Morganti Group provided equity for the project under an 80:20 debt:equity split.

Local banks – led by Arab Bank – provided debt for the project.

The MCC committed $275m to Jordan between 2011 and 2016, with the remainder going towards rehabilitating water and wastewater networks.