Can we use water pumps powered by alternative energy to irrigate dry lands with salt water？

One e-pal asked if they can use water pumps powered by alternative energy to irrigate dry lands with salt water. We thank you for asking and here we are trying to offer some answers. Hope that to be helpful.

Yes it is possible. After all, much of the lowlands of the Netherlands were reclaimed from the sea using dikes to impound an area, then using wind powered pumps (windmills) to pump out the impounded area.

However, salt water is not good for irrigating crops. Not many plants and no food crop plants that I know of grow well in a salty environment. That is why the old stories of devastating conflicts talk of “salting the fields” and poisoning the wells of an enemy.

The Netherlands lowlands were only purged of residual salt from the seawater by repeated filling of impounded areas with fresh water, so that the salt in the soil was absorbed into the water, and then pumping out the resulting brackish water.

You would therefore, generally speaking, also need a desalinization plant. Desalinization plants can also be powered by Alternative Energy.

The water pump is no problem. Many kinds of water pumps can be used for irrigation, for example, QS small electric submersible pump, QJ deep well pump. But salt water isn’t good for much; you need to desalinate which is expensive.

The “alternative energy’’ part is not relevant, other than the cost. Presumably that would be more expensive to build but less expensive to maintain and use.

In a word, to irrigate any crop in the region, salt water is not good for irrigation generally, except the crop likes salt specially. Water pumps can be powered by electric motor, diesel engine, gasoline engine, magnetic power, solar power or even wind power. But as the water is salty, you need to choose a pump that resists corrosion well.

Some of the answers are from other e-pals. weihu submersible pump manufacturers worked to collect them together here.