Picture used for illustrative purpose only.

Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) has launched the Smart Living initiative to raise awareness and help customers manage their high-usage of electricity and water, to make the right conservation decisions, without the need to contact DEWA.

This enhances their experience and reduces demand on the ‘Verification of Electricity/Water Consumption’ service.

The Smart Living initiative is part of DEWA’s efforts in promoting sustainable development in Dubai.

The Smart Living initiative includes a set of awareness and incentive programmes to conserve and manage their electricity and water consumption. It helps customers benefit from the accurate and instant information provided through DEWA’s smart channels, so customers can monitor home usage by themselves, analyse and resolve any issues that might be causing higher than usual consumption.

They can log into their DEWA accounts on the website or smart app, check their digital dashboards to monitor consumption, know more about residential customer tariff slabs, get conservation tips, and develop their conservation plans. Customers can also benefit from the ‘My Sustainable Living’ programme, by comparing consumption with similar homes. They can also make use of DEWA Store offers to purchase energy and water-saving devices.

Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, MD & CEO of DEWA, said that the Smart Living initiative relies on the smart grid and smart meter enablers, which are connected to customer accounts. The initiative enhances procedures, automates internal service operations, and connects them to DEWA’s grid using the latest Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies and Big Data technologies.

“The Smart Living initiative supports DEWA’s continuous efforts to raise customer awareness, saves money for them, reduces carbon footprint and overall environmental impact, improves the efficiency and speed of internal operations, and provides value-added smart services to save time and effort. This supports the Smart Dubai initiative, launched by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, to make Dubai the smartest city in the world.

"In line with its vision to become a globally leading sustainable innovative corporation, DEWA adopts a comprehensive strategy to encourage all society members to adopt a responsible lifestyle when consuming electricity and water. DEWA strives to raise awareness on the importance of conservation and waste reduction as part of social culture and daily behaviour. This supports the Demand Side Management strategy, which aims to reduce 30% of demand by 2030,” said Al Tayer.

“DEWA adopts innovation and the latest Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies to enrich customer experience and enhance their trust by encouraging them to self-manage their consumption and benefit from DEWA’s smart channels, website, and smart app to promote conservation and protect natural resources,” said Marwan bin Haidar, Executive Vice President of Innovation and the Future at DEWA.

The Smart Living initiative makes use of the ‘My Sustainable Living’ programme that enables residential customers to compare their monthly electricity and water usage with the average use of highly efficient homes to make informed decisions based on current data. This inspires healthy competition among customers to reduce their consumption. The programme has many features, including a digital dashboard that displays consumption comparisons, a monthly consumption report, and conservation tips. DEWA interacts with its users through its website, smart app, email and text messages.