An Arizona state water agency has dropped a controversial arrangement it made with an Israeli firm to negotiate terms for building a $5.5 billion water desalination plant in Mexico. Instead, the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority of Arizona will seek competitive bids for a company or other entity to build a water importation project — which may or may not be a desalination plant. … The authority, commonly known as WIFA, changed its stance in the face of stinging criticism of its board’s December vote from a wide variety of people and interest groups. Legislators of both parties, environmentalists, Sonoran officials and other “public interest” organizations had decried they felt was a rush to judgment on the IDE proposal.

Related article: 

• Business Insider: San Diego temporarily solved its water crisis by turning ocean water into fresh water. But desalination won’t work everywhere.