The Crown Prince Chairs the meeting of SEWA Board of Directors

Under the chairmanship of His Highness Sheikh Sultan Bin Mohammed Bin Sultan Al Qassimi, the Crown Prince and Deputy Ruler of Sharjah, SEWA Board of Directors held its monthly meeting on Thursday, February 22, 2007 at the Ruler/s Office.

The meeting addressed a number of issues and important matters related to the progress of work and plans to the requirements of Water, Electricity and Natural Gas projects.

Eng. Al Walid Khalid bin Khadim, the Director General of Sharjah Electricity and Water Authority stated that the Board reviewed the five-year plan for developing the authority’s three main services which will span from 2007 to 2011, and will ensure the availability of electricity, natural gas and drinking water supplies needed to meet the increasingly demand and face the growing urbanization and industrialization coupled with  a continuing increase in the number of population of Sharjah within the coming years. In addition to supporting and strengthening the distribution and transmission networks in order to absorb the new development projects and facing any cases of shortage in the area, adding to that water resources exploration and  development  of wellfields. Furthermore, the plan will include new projects on installation of more water desalination units and securing strategic groundwater supplies to meet the future water demand.

Eng. Al Walid Khalid bin Khadim pointed out that SEWA is putting all its efforts to harness its potential in order to meet the growing demand and the development of services offered to citizens and residents. In this regard, the ambitious five-year plan to provide a solid infrastructure that meets the upcoming challenges and achieves a qualitative leap to the work areas and sectors of SEWA.

The Board recommended that a new salary grading scale is to be introduced for the  local engineers. The proposed scale which will cover the positions from Grade 1 to Grade 4, will be designed to attract new local engineers to join SEWA.

The  Board was briefed about the proposed Area Cooling Project which will be executed to provide the areas in the city of Sharjah  with chilled water for cooling and air conditioning purposes through the   gas fired – cooling pumping stations  topumpchilled water through a network of pipelines supplying commercial, residential and industrial buildings in order to use it for.  This project is a big economic advantage and contributes to the conservation of electric energy, natural and financial resources.  In addition to saving part of the investments used for electricity generation, transmission and distribution stations and units. He also pointed out that a specialized company should be assigned to work on a feasibility study for the project in order to be implemented in commercial areas.

He added that the board discussed the water supply plan which will be adopted to meet the requirements in next summer season and  avoiding the water potential shortfall through rapid implementation of new water desalination units, which is being established at Al Layyah Power Station.  In addition to the transmission and distribution lines that are being completed and increasing water tanks storage capacity.

The board also reviewed a report on the preparation of a field study and analysis to assess the current status of the authority, which included a work plan, methodology of the study, documentation and analysis of the current situation and the study and analysis of work systems. 

The board  decided that a committee is to be formed from the  following members to study the assessment project of the current situation: Mr. Ahmed Mohammed Obeid Al Shamsi, Hassan Ismail Salman Al Nsai and Mr. Walid Ibrahim Al Sayegh in addition to  the Director General of SEWA 

The Board addressed a number of topics relating to the affairs of the authority, which, all in the service of the country and the citizen and had taken appropriate decisions regarding these topics.