11 minute read
Event Review
Time to take Action
Big Project ME recaps the events of the day at the inaugural Energy & Sustainability Summit, which was held on June 21, 2022 at the St Regis The Palm
On June 21, 2022, the inaugural edition of the Energy & Sustainability Summit was held at the St Regis The Palm on Palm Jumeirah, Dubai. With close to 200 delegates in attendance, a packed line up of speakers and presenters shared insights and debated a variety of topics around sustainability, green building and achieving net-zero in the construction industry.
Led by Big Project Middle East’s Head of Editorial and Content, Gavin Davids, the Summit focused on three key themes: Facilitating the Energy Transition; Project Development in the Age of Sustainability; and Achieving NetZero – What it means to be a Carbon Neutral Construction Company.
Following a welcome address by Davids, the Summit was kicked off by Abdullatif Albitawi, director of Emirates Green Building Council, who shared the council’s vision of Decarbonising Buildings and Advancing NetZero with a packed audience of industry representatives.
“This presentation was about the Net Zero Centre of Excellence that the council launched in 2018. It’s a platform for all professionals, organisations, and individuals to come together and work together to promote the Net Zero movement in the UAE. It gave an idea to the audience about what we are doing and allows those organisations and companies who are really keen and interested in achieving Net Zero, to work together and spread the word to others in the region,” he told Big Project ME after his presentation, while also expressing the hope that the industry would become more collaborative and supportive so as to reach their net zero targets.
Following on from that presentation, the day’s first panel discussion was begun, with Sachin Kerur, head of Middle East Region for Reed Smith. Focusing on why the region’s economies are investing heavily into the transition away from oil, the panellists discussed the huge economic opportunities on offer, why renewables are key to boosting the region’s power generation capacity, and a host of other topics.
Kerur was joined by Louise Collins, head of Project and Development Services UAE and head of Engineering and Energy MEA at JLL; Anita Nouri, CEO and Business Development director at Green Energy Solutions & Sustainability; Hamzeh Buqaei, manager of the Germany Energy Academy, Al Hussein Technical University in Jordan; David Haboubi, head of Nuclear and Net-Zero Energy
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at SNC-Lavalin; and Samiullah Khan, COO of Saif Air Tech.
“At the outset of the discussion, the general sentiment was that the energy industry is moving at a significant pace in its transition to clean forms of energy, and that the current global geopolitical issues will not hinder energy transition. Indeed, it was felt that the current energy transition programmes could actually be a direct route to energy security in the future,” Kerur told Big Project ME after leading the discussion.
“There was much positivity about the competitive advantages that the MENA region affords the construction and engineering industries. Each panellist highlighted local benchmark projects in the build environment. There was also a lively debate relating to clean hydrogen, carbon neutral fossil fuels, and the significance of battery storage projects and energy storage technology.
“What was evident from the perspective of the panellists was that regional energy transition will require major overhaul and expansion of related infrastructure, storage facilities and grids. In addition, there needs to be major capacity building in terms of upscaling research and development, education, technician and project management skills. This was seen as a potential constraint in the energy transition programme unless tackled early,” he added.
Following the panel discussion, Kareem Farah, CEO of Engineering Contracting Company (ECC), came on stage for a very well received presentation about Desert Board, the world’s first Engineered Wooden Board made from palm waste.
This presentation received a lot of positive feedback from attendees, with several members of the audience engaging with Farah during the Q&A session and during the networking break.
The Summit kicked off its second session with a panel discussion is a key to accelerating sustainable development of societies. The rising age of sustainability demands that project managers incorporate the environmental, social, economic, and political aspects into one design framework that can cater to our vision of sustainable cities,” said Ghina Annan after hosting the panel discussion.
“This process, however, is not without its challenges. Be it due to planning, project stages, client demands, team dynamic, labour shortage, or external factors, sustainable project design and implementation faces numerous hurdles. The Energy and Sustainability Summit presented a deeper look into project management in the age of sustainability inclusive of current trends, strategies, and challenges present, as well as their outlook.
“The principal key takeaways involved defining project strategies and incorporating sustainability at a very early stage, setting reasonable projects targets, implementing the right sustainable strategies, and finally tracking and reporting progress. The biggest challenge highlighted in discussed projects is to get it right up front as there are many different types of risks encountered: Technical, financial, legal, regulatory etc. Essentially, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have set path to become zero-carbon economies by 2050. Hence, the top priority now would be achieving energy transition and climate action goals through increasing energy efficiency, decarbonising power generation with renewables and shifting building loads towards electricity and low-carbon synthetic fuels,” she added.
“Given the current opportunities, all project investments should consider solutions needed to mitigate and avoid dangerous climate change significant impacts. The enthusiasm of investors, designers, developers and stakeholders should
hosted by Ghina Annan, senior Sustainability Specialist at Stantec, who led panellists Ian Williamson, chief projects officer at The Red Sea Development Company; Karim El-Jisr, chief sustainability officer at Diamond Developers, Jesùs Sancho, director general – Middle East for ACCIONA; Dr Ioannis Spanos, director of Sustainability at KEO International Consultants; and Başar Kayali, general manager of ALEC Energy; in a discussion about how developers, consultants and contractors are collaborating to implement sustainable design principles across their projects.
“To envision a sustainable future is to envision green cities, clean energy, and protected natural resources. The crucial role of project management, thus, prevails. Proper implementation be matched with political action while involving decision makers, increasing understanding of sustainability and climate change and creating awareness about the need for society to adapt.”
Up next was a presentation by Samiullah Khan, COO of Saif Air Tech, who shared insights into how improving indoor air quality can have a significant impact on the wellness, productivity and health of occupants, while also impacting on the overall efficiency and performance of a building.
After a break for lunch, the third and final session of the day began, with Gavin Davids leading Ian Williamson; Matthew Tribe, managing director – Buildings and Places Middle East for Atkins; Jonathan Spear, Transport Policy and Strategy Advisor, also for Atkins; and Dr Pablo Izquierdo, Energy Efficiency manager at the
Energy Efficiency and Renewables Office at Ras Al Khaimah Municipality; in a discussion about the major interdependencies between the Energy Sector, the Built Environment Sector, and the Transport and Mobility Sectors.
The panellists highlighted the opportunities, risks and recommendations for each sector to drive the net-zero agenda in the GCC, while also discussing the role the built environment can play in tackling the climate crisis, and how the decarbonisation of the region’s energy and transport systems is vital to achieving Net Zero ambitions.
“I was talking about the need to integrate land use and transport planning to deliver truly sustainable cities, as well as the practicalities of delivering the evolution of the electric vehicle over the next decade,” said Jonathan Spear to Big Project ME after his panel.
“We also discussed some of the real problems and issues that we would need to confront to decarbonise road transport. Finally, one of the points made was that it’s not just about technology in order to decarbonise transport, we also need behavioural change and to manage demand, as well as investing in other smart technologies.”
Furthermore, he stressed that the world is in a climate emergency and that the industry should not view decarbonisation as a ‘2050 Agenda’ but as something that needs to be tackled immediately.
He also touched up on the launch of the Engineering Net Zero Report at the end of the Panel Discussion, highlighting its significance towards the region’s net zero agendas.
“What we’ve tried to do in the report is really bring the Net Zero tourism projects has kept the environment and sustainability at the core of its efforts to develop the mammoth site.
Over the course of his presentation, he outlined TRSDC’s commitment to biodiversity conservation and enhancement, the steps taken to identify valued environmental receptors in marine environments, and the nature of scientific studies conducted, and how they informed the design of a project asset.
The final panel discussion of the day was moderated by Farah Naz, head of Innovation and ESG at AECOM Middle East and Africa. She led a panel of experts that included: Engi Jaber, CEO and managing director of Climatize Engineering Consultants; Katarina Uherova Hasbani, partner and global director of Strategy and Advisory at AESG; Mario Saab, head of Sustainability – MENA at Cundall; Tadhg O’Donovan, deputy vice principal, Academic Leadership and head of the School of Engineering and Physical Sciences at Heriot-Watt University in Dubai; and Sophia Kee, head of Future Ready – Property and Buildings at WSP Middle East.
The conversation focused on the need for the construction industry to move from a compliance-focused approach to a performance-focused approach in order to advance the net zero agenda. It also took in the importance of government policy and leadership in achieving net zero targets, while panellists discussed how a circular economy can lead to sustainable infrastructure.
“Today’s conference was interesting. We learnt quite a few things – the first being that we really need an actionable implementation plan for cities. Secondly, a carbon tax will play a huge role in this transition, and thirdly, when we look at carbon, we need to true carbon, which is design carbon, construction carbon and operational carbon. Fourthly, the role of education is extremely important in educating future generations to learn about how to do the transition, and fifth, stakeholder engagement is extremely important, and this brings me to the sixth point, which is policy development – there was a huge conversation about policies needing to be required.
“Policies need to be actionable, implementable, and once we have the policies to move the industry towards Net Zero transition, then the seventh point that raised was that we need proof of concepts. That means that we need small case studies of real projects for three to six months, learn from them and then go and update the policies. We need circular thinking in the industry to really create the net zero transition,” Farah Naz said as she summed up the discussion after the panel.
“The last point that came up was about green finances and businesses cases. We really need to move away from the ‘business as usual’ business model, to a model that has impact investments, that talks about sustainability and social responsibilities. For me, that’s a conversation with ESG – Environmental, Social and Governance.
“We didn’t really mention it in the panel, but you can only create a business case when you bring the Environment, Social Impact and Governance together. That ESG is the underlying factor for the Net Zero transition,” she concluded, ahead of the summit closing.
agenda to the GCC. We’ve set out the baseline of what countries are currently committing to, or trying to do, but we’ve also tried to make practical recommendations in different sectors – the transportation sector, the built environment sector, the energy sector, city planning and so on, on what needs to be done over the next few years to promote net zero and get truly sustainable development into the region,” he explained.
The penultimate event of the day was a presentation by Ali Mumtaz of The Red Sea Development Company, who shared insights into how the developer behind one of the world’s biggest regenerative
