Gulf Construction Online

UAE Focus

News in brief

01 January 2022

Nuclear plant in final phase

Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation (Enec) has announced that the last two units – Units 3 and 4 – of its ambitious Barakah nuclear plant project coming up in the Al Dhafra region of Abu Dhabi are in the final stages of commissioning.

The Emirati firm said Unit 3 is already undergoing operational readiness preparations.

The development of the Barakah Plant as a whole is now more than 96 per cent complete. When fully operational, the four units of the Barakah Plant will prevent 21 million tonnes of carbon emissions every year for more than 60 years, said senior Enec officials during the inspection tour of the visiting International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi.

UAQ desal plant set for operations

Work has been completed on the first phase of the Umm Al Quwain (UAQ) Water Desalination Plant which is coming up on a 250,000-sq-m area in the northern emirate.

Being built at a cost of AED2.2 billion ($598 million), the new plant will produce 50 million imperial gallons per daily (MIGD), while the total production capacity will reach 150 MIGD once commissioned.

Based on reverse osmosis technology, the project is expected to be commercially operational in the third quarter of 2022, it stated.

Announcing the opening of the key phase, Suhail bin Mohammed Al Mazrouei, Minister of Energy and Infrastructure, said the UAQ desalination plant is the largest in the country’s north.

“With the inauguration of the first phase, two tanks with a capacity of 30 million gallons each will be operated,” he added.

2,200 solar panels for Mapei plant

Mapei Group, a leading Italian manufacturer of adhesives, sealants and chemical products for the construction industry, has announced that one of its subsidiaries, Mapei Construction Chemicals, has teamed up with UAE-based Yellow Door Energy, to install over 2,200 solar panels at its manufacturing plant in Dubai Investment Park.

The 1.2 MW solar plant will generate 1,922,000 kilowatt-hours of clean energy in its first year of operations.

Mapei said installation of the solar panels will commence early this year and will cover an area of 8,900 sq m of the plant’s rooftop, significantly lowering its electricity costs, with 85 per cent of the firm’s energy consumption needs being generated through the solar lease.