When Abu Dhabi National Energy Company (TAQA) announced the acquisition of Spanish water firm GS Inima for $1.2 billion on Aug. 25, the state-owned utility billed the deal as a step toward building a “world-class, integrated global water platform.” Days later, Dubai’s AMEA Power unveiled plans for a $200 million desalination venture in Angola — just weeks after announcing a Moroccan water project.

On paper, these were ordinary corporate expansions. In practice, these moves by companies from the United Arab Emirates signal something larger: Super-arid Gulf states — long global leaders in domestic desalination — are now casting wider nets abroad in a sector that could prove as strategic as oil in a warming century. This comes as Saudi Arabia’s state-backed renewables developer ACWA Power is also targeting global water deals.

According to Naser Alsayed, a policy fellow focused on green economic growth at the London-based think tank Bourse & Bazaar Foundation, the main driver for Gulf investment in water projects abroad is to leverage their expertise in the sector. “Over the past 45 years, despite extreme scarcity, they have turned water provision into a success story, meeting rising demand and leading in technologies such as desalination and efficient systems,” Alsayed told Al-Monitor.

Some 21,000 desalination plants operate today in around 150 countries, with half of global installed capacity located in the Middle East and North Africa, according to the International Energy Agency.