Emirates to join GCC-wide power grid in bid to regulate distribution

Chris Stanton

• Last Updated: March 23. 2009 10:13PM UAE / March 23. 2009 6:13PM GMT

The UAE has agreed to join a GCC-wide electricity grid, allowing it to share power with its neighbours.

Mohammed al Hamili, the Minister of Energy, signed an agreement in the capital in the presence of representatives from the GCC secretariat, the official state news agency WAM reported.

The agreement will provide the basis of regulation of power distribution across the region as the grid is completed in stages over the next two years.

GCC leaders see the grid as part of the solution to the region’s power crisis, as utilities within each country will be able to share power during peak periods, reducing the need for expensive new power stations.

Time-zone differences throughout the region mean the peak periods are staggered.

Governments in the region have faced difficulties in building sufficient numbers of power stations to accommodate rapidly increasing demand. Natural gas remains in short supply, oil products are expensive and polluting, and other options, such as nuclear, are years from development.

In January, a representative from the GCC Interconnection Authority said construction of power lines for the first stage of the network was nearly complete.

The first stage of the grid will link the four northern GCC states of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Qatar, while a secondary network will be built to join the UAE and Oman. A third stage will connect the two networks, so that power operators in Kuwait, for example, could one day buy electricity from Oman.

The development would halve the amount of reserve power capacity that each country would otherwise have to build to ensure an adequate electricity supply during peak periods and power station shutdowns, according to estimates by the GCC Interconnection Authority.

The grid would also raise generating efficiency because emergencies that take power stations out of action are unlikely to strike neighbouring states simultaneously.

cstanton@thenational.ae