Transforming waste into sustainable energy source for Dubai 10X initiative

The Dubai Municipality has developed its groundbreaking “Wastenizer” project, which transports and processes waste to generate energy, as its proposal for the Dubai 10X Initiative – an ambitious venture overseen by the Dubai Future Foundation (DFF).

As it stands, the Emirate of Dubai produces 3.5 million tons of waste annually; uses 7,560 square meters of land as landfills; deploys 3,850 garbage collection vehicles to all its districts; all at a daily operating cost of AED2.3 million.

Once implemented, the Wastenizer system will produce 17,500 tons of good ash for the production of green concrete. The pilot phase of the project has been scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2018, with the system entering full implementation in several regions of the emirate just before the opening of Expo 2020.

His Highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai, Chairman of the Dubai Executive Council and Chairman of DFF’s Board of Trustees, launched the bold plan, among several avant-garde proposals for Dubai 10X at the 6^th World Government Summit, held in Dubai in February 2018. The Dubai 10X initiative seeks to place Dubai Government entities 10 years ahead of the rest of the world in all sectors, propelling the emirate into the future by implementing today what other cities around the world will be implementing 10 years from now.

H.H. Sheikh Hamdan approved 26 projects presented by 24 government entities. The shortlisted projects were evaluated by a panel of experts out of a total of more than 160 ideas submitted by 36 parties in less than 365 days.

His Excellency Dawood Abdul Rahman Abdullah Al Hajiri, Director General of Dubai Municipality, said: “The Dubai Municipality has set an action plan to implement the project immediately after the launch; the plan was titled ‘The Vision of the Future City, Today’. To that end, we formed a task force consisting of young, passionate and driven Emiratis to carry out this initiative, and firmly establish the global leadership of the Dubai Municipality.”

The initiative consists of developing a world-first, decentralized waste-treatment platform for buildings and residential districts in Dubai. The system uses technology developed by Dubai Municipality to treat all types of solid waste after sorting them using artificial intelligence (AI) and smart technologies. The decentralized units raise the temperature of the waste resulting in the breakdown of its chemical components, producing clean electrical energy that will be exported to the local electricity grid.

The initiative is a continuation of the Dubai Municipality’s project to convert solid waste into energy; the project includes building the world’s largest energy terminal in terms of production capacity and thermal conversion efficiency. This, in turn, contributes to the Dubai Integrated Waste Management Master Plan, which seeks to steer 100% of the city’s waste away from landfills by the year 2030.