Dubai Municipality allocates Dh7 billion in health and environment projects

Dubai - The project includes the construction of a main line to collect rainwater to serve the Airport and Expo areas.

Dubai Municipality has allocated Dhs7 billion in this year's budget for executing infrastructure development and new huge-sized high-priority projects and services in the field of health and environment.
Eng. Hussain Nasser Lootah, Director General of Dubai Municipality said, "The lion's share of the volume of expenditure in the budget will be received by the storm water tunnel project for the Airport City and the Expo Venue areas, which amounted to Dhs5 billion. These projects, which will be completed by 2019,  are 55% completed, and will be operational before the opening of Expo 2020. Work is under way in full swing on an area of 42,000 hectares."
He pointed out that the project includes the construction of a main line to collect rainwater to serve the Airport and Expo areas. "The areas of the project include the Deira, for which initial study has been done. Currently, primary design is being studied, which includes the drilling of two tunnels and the pipelines will be extending up to 13 kilometres," said Lootah.
"The sewage treatment plant in Jebel Ali project comes in second place in terms of importance. It is worth Dhs1.4 billion and will be completed in 2018, and will serve 1.8 million people in an area of 25,000 hectares. It will also be keeping pace with future expansion projects, as well as the high-profile events that will be witnessed by Dubai, notably Expo 2020," he said.
"The Jebel Ali power plant will reach the capacity of up to 675,000 cubic meters per day instead of its current capacity of 300,000, as it is designed with the latest international technology and made safe and environmentally friendly. It also ensures the water generated is with the high characteristics and quality to be used for irrigating the plantations," said Lootah.
He stressed the expansion will be carried out at the station with three basic objectives: to absorb the excess flow resulting from the Expo areas, keep up with the upcoming expansion projects in the emirate, and the diversion of a portion of the load of Warsan Station to Jebel Ali, as it is operating above design capacity by about 27% .
He pointed out that it is perfectly safe, and the Municipality has taken all the precautions, and the sludge will be dealt with thermally to produce high quality fertilizer, which can be used to enrich agricultural land.
He explained that the treated water from the sewage is used to reduce the pressure on water resources, as it is used in every major public parks, residential parks, neighborhood parks, resorts, natural areas, entertainment and recreation venues, and in the city greening as a whole, adding that it is also used in cooling and moisturizing the city and reduce the temperature in the hot areas in the vicinity of factories or uncultivated areas.
"The Municipality also faces the challenges of increasing waste water quantity, and is keen to raise the level of health within the ecological system of the Emirate of Dubai. We want to increase the areas connected through the sewage networks in Dubai to 100%. Hence, we have embarked upon a project to establish a sewerage and storm water drainage network in Khawaneej-2 at a cost of Dhs300 million. This project, which covers the entire areas of Khawaneej-2, will be completed this year," pointed out Lootah.
He said the Deira area development project with a cost of Dhs243 million, covers several areas such as Al Qusais and includes establishment of 13.7 km long underground sewer lines, and is expected to be completed in 2018.
- reporters@khaleejtimes.com

• Dubai