UAE Law and Practice Contributed by: Brendan Hundt, Dan Feldman, Sam Anastasiou and Saiesh Kamath, King & Spalding LLP
For a private project, an interconnection should not be treated as equivalent to an export route. The GCC framework supports electricity exchange and regional security of supply, but a UAE project company will still need to comply with its domestic licence, grid connection arrangements, offtake restrictions and any approvals required by the relevant utility or gov- ernment authority. Trading through interconnection remains, in practice, under government purview. 2.3 Supply Mix of Electricity The UAE’s national electricity supply mix has histori- cally been dominated by natural gas-fired generation, which continues to provide the majority of the UAE’s electricity. The traditional sources of gas feedstock are from local ADNOC wells and Qatar via the Dolphin gas pipeline. Despite the focus on increasing renewables capacity in recent years, the most recent International Energy Agency data available estimated that natural gas gen- eration accounted for approximately 71% of the UAE’s electricity supply. This reflects the continuing role of dispatchable gas-fired generation in meeting peak demand while large-scale BESS deployment remains nascent and solar generation remains intermittent. The electricity mix is, however, diversifying quick- ly. Nuclear electricity from the Barakah plant now accounts for a significant portion of the UAE’s elec- tricity demand (20% as of 2024), with renewables, predominantly solar PV generation, making up the remaining 8–9%. Renewables are expected to make up an increasingly large portion of the UAE’s energy mix as major solar projects and BESS facilities continue to be developed. However, the UAE market is also seeing a “comeback” of thermal power (which is expected to continue in the short to medium term) while these renewables pro- jects are being deployed to meet the large, and imme- diate, demand for reliable and dispatchable energy
apply to the electricity market as the regime express- ly carves out the state-owned utilities that dominate UAE power. Market concentration in core electricity supply is largely a consequence of statutory and licensed util- ity functions, single-buyer procurement and emirate- specific public utility mandates. General UAE competition law may nevertheless apply to mergers, acquisitions and joint ventures involving power-sector entities unless a statutory exclusion applies. Federal Decree Law No 36 of 2023 regulates anti-competitive agreements, abuse of dominant posi- tion and economic concentrations. Cabinet Resolu- tion No 3 of 2025 sets relevant ratios, including a 40% dominant-position threshold and economic-concen- tration notification thresholds based on AED300 mil- lion annual UAE sales in the relevant market or a 40% share of total relevant-market transactions. Cabinet Resolution No 59 of 2026 (in force from 30 July 2026) issued the executive regulations in respect of Fed- eral Decree Law No 36 of 2023, which includes the procedural rules for economic concentration applica- tions, filing responsibility and formal examinations, among other provisions on economic tests. In prac- tice, competition analysis may be more likely in spon- sor acquisitions, operation and maintenance services, energy-services companies, equipment supply, port- folio consolidations and joint ventures than in core statutory utility functions. Oversight of competition compliance lies with the Competition Department of the Federal Ministry of Economy and Tourism and extensive co-ordination is envisaged with federal authorities who regulate eco- nomic sectors. The regime is enforced through mandatory pre-closing merger review and through investigation of abusive conduct, backed by a tiered penalty framework under the Competition Law, including fines of up to 10% of relevant annual sales. In practice, the state-ownership exclusion in Article 4 means the concentrated, state- owned structure of UAE electricity supply could sit largely outside these limits.
from AI and other digital infrastructure. 2.4 Market Concentration Limits
In the UAE market issues are addressed through the federal competition regime, aimed at prohibiting the abuse of a dominant position. However, this does not
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