Drive to nurture culture of safety awareness intensified

The Department of Energy (DoE) launched a summer readiness awareness campaign about petroleum and gas systems safety and security in Abu Dhabi. The campaign’s objective is to promote safety standards, best practices, and the new regulatory requirements of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi.

The summer readiness campaign aims to enhance the safe use of petroleum products and promote a culture of safety awareness across the commercial, industrial, and residential sectors, particularly for anyone using liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) daily.

As part of this initiative, the DoE teams will engage with gas operators, establishments, and individuals over the summer months to raise awareness of safety standards, offer support, and increase awareness about the importance of compliance with the new regulations. The summer campaign will include visits to restaurants, shopping malls, hotels, palaces, residential apartment buildings, villas, storage facilities, and large plants.

To kick off the campaign, the DoE Acting Director-General of Regulatory Affairs, Dr. Saif Saeed Al Qubaisi, visited Al Khalidiya Mall and Al Bateen Park Villas and Buildings in Abu Dhabi to inspect their central gas systems and offer support on complying with safety standards.

Dr. Al Qubaisi said, “Safety is our top priority. One of the key objectives of this campaign is to reach as many stakeholders as possible. By engaging our stakeholders in person, we hope to build relationships, provide guidance on the new standards, and ensure that operators are complying with them.”

During the inspections, Ahmed Alsayed Mohamed Alsheebani, the DoE’s Acting Executive Director of Regulatory Affairs for the Petroleum Products Sector, urged all sector operators and establishments to reach out to the DoE for any clarifications regarding regulations, the permitting system, and safety standards. He emphasised, “We are here to promote public safety,” and reiterated “We are ready to support in every way and assist all with becoming compliant”.

The DoE was recently mandated to regulate all aspects of trading petroleum products (for all non-ADNOC private operators) in the Emirate. As part of the mandate, the DoE is working on building a unified permit platform to govern and monitor trading activities of petroleum products and unify standards. Alsheebani explained, “Effectively, we are consolidating and streamlining the petroleum products sector codes (starting with LPG) and collaborating with relevant Abu Dhabi partners to ensure a safer, sustainable, more environmentally friendly sector.”

The DoE’s proactive approach to working collaboratively with the petroleum products ecosystem and other Abu Dhabi enforcement partners on creating a culture of compliance reflects its broader commitment to driving a safe, secure, and sustainable supply of energy and water in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi.

Alsheebani emphasised that the intention of our regulatory framework was to ease doing business safely and effectively across all petroleum products in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi in the interest of public safety and our environment.

“We cannot do this alone. We are working with all relevant stakeholders, partners and communities in the petroleum products sector ecosystem in the emirate to raise awareness of the standards and best practices. This is the focus our summer readiness campaign and site inspections,” he concluded.

Emirates’ operating initiatives save 48,000 tonnes of fuel, cut emissions by 151,000 tonnes: Emirates embarked on implementing “Green Operating Procedures” (Green Ops) in 2016, taking a multi-pronged approach that looks for opportunities to reduce on-ground and in-flight fuel use, in addition to providing pilots with the necessary education, awareness, data analytics and technology to help them manage their flights as efficiently as possible.

In a report released titled ‘How Emirates pilots reduce fuel emissions during operations’, the airline highlighted its efforts, led by an internal cross-functional Operations Efficiency Steering Group, to mitigate unnecessary fuel burn and emissions wherever possible, while ensuring the highest safety standards embraced by Emirates are never compromised. In the last financial year 2023-2024, ‘Green Ops’ and other operating initiatives helped Emirates reduce fuel burn by more than 48,000 tonnes and carbon emissions by over 151,000 tonnes.

WAM