DEWA wins Green Initiative and Technology awards at 10th Ideas.Arabia

Environment

DEWA wins Green Initiative and Technology awards at 10th Ideas.Arabia

Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) has won two awards at the 10th International Ideas.Arabia Conference 2015, in the Green Initiative and Technology categories. The event was organised by Ideas.Arabia, part of Dubai Quality Group. The conference, under the theme Pillars of Innovation, was held under the patronage of HH Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, President of Dubai Civil Aviation Authority, Chairman and Chief Executive of the Emirates Airline & Group. The conference featured experts in innovation and organisational innovation, and eminent entrepreneurs and professionals. They discussed the latest developments in the suggestion reward schemes from around the world.

DEWA has won the Idea of the Year Award in the Green Initiative category, for the 13MW first phase of the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park and Idea of the Year Award in the Technology category, for the Distribution Planning teams idea to develop a backfill material from locally-sourced mixtures of materials for MV cables. This has improved MV cable ratings, reduced thermal sensitivity, and extended durability.

His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai once observed that, Creativity and ideas can build countries and institutions. The future belongs to those who generate ideas. We are pleased with this accolade from Ideas.Arabia, whose theme is Pillars of Innovation, which complements declaring 2015 as the Year of Innovation. It also supports the National Innovation Strategy to make the UAE one of the most innovative countries in the world, and the vision of our wise leadership to develop the organisational environment, enhance quality, and stimulate innovation and creativity among employees to achieve organisational and UAE National goals, and strategies, said HE Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, MD & CEO of DEWA.

These two awards reflect DEWAs ongoing efforts to adopt and implement a culture of creativity and innovation in all its initiatives and projects, particularly in renewable and clean energy, and providing highly-reliable and efficient electricity and water services. These efforts contribute to achieving our vision to become a sustainable innovative world-class utility. I commend Dubai Quality Groups organising this annual conference, which has established its position as a leading platform for stimulating ideas, organisational creativity, and exchanging ideas and best practices to improve performance in the government and private sectors. The conference, in its tenth year, has become a rich think-tank for public and private organisations in the region. It highlights specialised research and the latest organisational development methodologies. It highlights quality improvement approaches, honours innovative employees, and fosters a spirit of creativity and innovation among them, added Al Tayer.

DEWA is working to promote the creative capabilities of its staff by providing a positive and stimulating work environment, and by providing training programmes to enhance their knowledge and creative capability. We provide incentives and awards throughout the year to enhance positive competitiveness among staff. We value our employees and adopt the best practices and global HR systems that provide a positive working environment that helps us achieve success in various work areas, concluded Al Tayer.

The first phase of the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park has won the Distinguished Technical Project award at the Dubai Government Excellence Programme Awards (DGEP) 2015.

DEWA operates the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park, which is one of the largest strategic renewable energy projects in the region, with a planned total capacity of 3,000MW by 2030. The 13MW first phase became operational on 22 October 2013. DEWA doubled the capacity of the second phase from 100MW to 200MW. It will be operational by 2017. DEWA has also increased the capacity of the third phase to 800MW. The project, which is based on the Independent Power Producer (IPP) model, is another achievement that will put Dubai and the UAE at the forefront of the countries in the region in producing renewable and clean energy.

The award-winning idea in the Technology category has helped enhance the cable-carrying capacity of medium voltage cables by 9-18%. This has achieved financial savings of AED8.5-12.1 million for each substation. The use of backfill materials from the local environment reduces thermal sensitivity from 1.6 to 1 Watt per metre Kelvin (Km/W).