DEWA sets world record as Dubai power outages drop to 49 seconds a year

Dubai: Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) has surpassed its own world record for power reliability, achieving a new global low of 0.82 minutes, roughly 49 seconds, in Customer Minutes Lost (CML) per year. The milestone, announced by HE Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, MD & CEO of DEWA, represents a 13% improvement over the authority's previous world record of 0.94 minutes set in 2024, and firmly establishes Dubai as the global leader in electricity service continuity.

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"We work in line with the vision and directives of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, to provide the best electricity and water infrastructure in the world. We utilise the latest technologies of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, particularly artificial intelligence, which we are fully integrating into DEWA's strategies and operations. The smart grid is a fundamental pillar of DEWA's strategy to deliver services according to the highest standards of availability, reliability and efficiency. This supports the Dubai 2040 Urban Master Plan and the Dubai Economic Agenda (D33), which seek to consolidate Dubai's position among the top three global cities", said Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, Managing Director and CEO of Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA).

Behind this achievement lies DEWA's ambitious Smart Grid programme, backed by a total investment of AED 7 billion through 2035. The initiative modernises the energy transmission and distribution network, cutting outages, reducing losses, and optimising electrical load management, all while raising the bar for customer satisfaction.

Central to its success is the Automatic Smart Grid Restoration System, a regional first for the Middle East and North Africa. Operating entirely without human intervention, the system delivers continuous, remote monitoring and control around the clock, using intelligent centralised platforms that detect, isolate and resolve faults, dramatically accelerating power restoration.

The scale of DEWA's progress over the past decade tells a compelling story. In 2012, Dubai's CML stood at 6.88 minutes per year. By 2025, that figure had fallen to just 0.82 minutes, nearly 18 times better than the European Union average of approximately 15 minutes among leading utilities. The result places Dubai not just at the top of regional rankings, but at the very forefront of global utility performance.