The global market for Desalination Technologies is projected to reach US$24.6 billion by the year 2027, trailing a post COVID-19 CAGR of 9.8%, over the analysis period 2020 through 2027. Several factors over the decades have played a role in aggravating the shortage of water supply, which continuous to gain frightening proportions. These factors include globalization, rapid economic development, industrialization, urbanization, pollution, water contamination, continued subsidization and promotion of unsustainable agricultural methods including inefficient irrigation methods, growing popularity of water-guzzling bio-fuel farming, water abuse in industrial and manufacturing sectors, short-sighted water policies, poor water conservation (lack of water harvesting and water retention strategies), growing population, and climate change in the form of higher than normal environmental temperatures and the ensuing evaporation of surface and ground water. Groundwater withdrawals for industrial and agricultural use has been spiraling in sync with the rapid expansion of the manufacturing, energy industries and increase in acreage of arable land in response to food security concerns to feed a massively growing population. Ground water contamination is hitting a peak in developing countries, where over 70% of industrial waste is discharged untreated into water in addition to dumping over 90% of wastewater into water bodies without adequate treatment.

Key factors contributing to water pollution include increasing effluent discharge by industries in developing and developed countries alike, dumping of untreated or partially treated sewage residential homes and commercial businesses into water bodies, fertilizers and pesticides from farming and other discharges from farmlands, washing of sediments from construction sites into water bodies, among others. In developing countries over 85% of wastewater is left untreated and is dumped into the water bodies such as lakes, rivers and coastal areas, thus jeopardizing food security, public health, and access to fresh potable drinking water. Industrial waste comprising of cadmium, arsenic, and bromides are hazardous to human health, and contamination of water with these toxins poses serious health issues. Furthermore with the increasing use of fertilizers for boosting agricultural productivity, nitrate contamination of ground water and rivers is increasing. The level of Nitrate contamination projected increase it by over 15% globally especially in India and Africa over the next 3 decades. Aging and decaying water infrastructures and transport pipelines especially in developed countries are resulting in increased water losses. Several regions including the United States are witnessing rapid depletion of water tables, and draining of high plains water. In the United States, water density in Lake Mead near Las Vegas declined by over 6 trillion gallons. The country on an average uses 150 trillion gallons of fresh water a year while over 50% of rivers and lakes are being rendered unusable and unfit for human use as a result of pollution and contamination.

Desalination is defined as the process of converting saline unusable water into fresh usable one, through extraction and removal of dissolved salts from available water sources in order to make it viable for human use. Desalination involves extensive filtration of relatively saline water through either distillation or membrane filtration for reclaiming usable fresh water from unusable saline, brackish as well as waste water sources. Desalination technology has evolved over the years, and the process of desalination is increasingly cost-effective and has emerged as a viable alternative means of sourcing fresh water in order to satisfy its burgeoning demand from different consumption sectors such as domestic, industrial and even to a lesser extent agriculture. With average rainfall of just 20-40cm a year, the Middle-East is one of the driest places on the planet and is prone to extreme aridity. The region has always received scanty rainfall and thus has always suffered from absolute water scarcity. Despite the relatively high cost of desalinated water, the need to sustain human habitation has been the chief overriding factor contributing to the growth of water desalination technologies. Several major cities in the Middle-East almost entirely depend on desalinated seawater for their potable water supplies. The region is home to one of the world's largest research center "The Middle East Desalination Research Center (MEDRC)". The center operates with the objective of R&D in desalination with the goal of reducing overall costs. Technologies being focused upon include Thermal Processes, Membrane Processes and Hybrid Desalination Processes, in addition to other Non-traditional and Alternative Processes. Middle-East accounts for more than 55% of the global installed desalination capacity, with Saudi-Arabia, UAE and the Persian Gulf states accounting for a major share. Saudi Arabia represents the single largest market for desalination technologies with almost half of its water requirements satisfied by desalinated water. The region accounts for about one-fifth of global desalinated water production, estimated at about 4 million cubic metres of desalinated water per day. The nation plans to triple the capacity of desalination production to 8.5 million cu m per day by 2025.