Labworx

The UAE is attempting to improve its food security situation and diversify its energy portfolio in a single stroke, through pursuing agricultural innovations and modern technology. At present, the country imports the vast majority of its food produce from various locations around the world, but has set its sights on bolstering its own capacity to grow enough crops to feed its populace in the co...

p>Starting next year, Abu Dhabi is set to begin collecting used cooking oil from homes, restaurants and other commercial premises for use in its new biofuel plant. Operated by the emirate’s waste management centre Tadweer, the scheme aims to cut waste and create a new fuel source all at the same time.

Homeowners will be issued with special containers in which to store their used oil, which w...

What Are Clean Energy Certificates?

The UAE is one step closer to opening up a market for trading renewable energy attributes with the announcement of its Clean Energy Certificates scheme. As a voluntary tradeable financial instrument, Clean Energy Certificates will allow businesses to demonstrate their environmental credentials and reap the social benefits of consuming low- or zero-carbon e...

The Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) has introduced lithium batteries made by Tesla into its energy storage profile at the world’s largest single-site solar farm. The Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum Solar Park has the capacity for the generation of 1GW of solar power per annum and is overseeing a pilot project of battery energy storage systems (BESSs) made by Tesla.

The initial tr...

As part of the national shift towards decarbonising its economy and enhancing its environmental profile, the UAE has announced the creation of solar landfills in the emirate of Sharjah. The project is a collaboration between waste processing firm Bee’ah and Masdar, the renewable energy company of Abu Dhabi.

The Sharjah project aims to turn closed landfill sites – which themselves are respons...

Extended periods of heavy rainfall have become more commonplace in the UAE over the last 20 years, according to a new report. Undertaken jointly by the National Centre of Meteorology (NCM) and the Khalifa University of Science and Technology, the report found that climate change was most likely to blame for an increase of mesoscale convective systems (MCSs).

This type of weather phenomenon n...

The Covid-19 pandemic has seen a dramatic rise in the use of medical grade gloves. In order to prevent the spread of infection, healthcare professionals, patients and members of the general public are asked to wear gloves when interacting with one another, with the vast majority of these gloves thrown away after just one use.

What’s worse, experts predict that over a third of those gloves ar...

A non-profit organisation in the UAE is investigating the production of a salt-tolerant crop to diversify its energy portfolio. Set up in 1999, the ICBA is committed to sourcing highly resistant plants which can tolerate extreme climates and thrive when fed with saline water. Salicornia, a genus of edible succulent from the southern United States, fits that bill.

Having already been establis...

A prominent UAE official made headlines last month by hinting that the UAE may become the first oil-rich nation to introduce a net-zero carbon target. Speaking to Bloomberg, the Minister for Climate Change and Environment Qais Al Suwaidi said that the country was considering such an announcement in the near future.

To date, some 44 countries have made net-zero proposals, although only 10 of ...

An Indian student at a UAE school has come up with an innovative method of reducing air pollution and combatting climate change. Tanay Jagannathan, who is a Grade 8 pupil at GEMS Modern Academy in Dubai, is aiming to design an attachment carrying sodium hydroxide which can be fitted to the underside of the main body of a drone aircraft.

Sodium hydroxide is a chemical capable of absorbing car...