Dubai Plans $22 Billion of Energy Projects Over Next Five Years

(Bloomberg) --Dubai Electricity & Water Authority will spend 81 billion dirhams ($22 billion) on energy projects over the next five years, with renewables accounting for a growing share of electricity output, Chief Executive Officer Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer said.

DEWA last week awarded a contract for a 815-MW gas turbine project in the Dubai suburb of Al Aweer to Germany’s Siemens AG and Egypt’s El Sewedy Power, Al Tayer said in a Bloomberg television interview. The company is also building the world’s largest solar energy park as it seeks to reduce reliance on natural gas as the main source of energy for electricity.

“Our strategy is 75 percent by 2050 will be renewable,” he said. “By 2020 we will achieve more than our target. Our target is 7 percent but I think we will achieve 8 to 9 percent.”

DEWA is also building the region’s first hydroelectric pumped storage plant in Hatta with total capacity of 250 megawatts of power, Al Tayer said.

-Hussein Slim