ENEC and Barakah: The Arab World’s First Nuclear Plant

Four reactors on the Arabian Gulf coast in Abu Dhabi’s Al Dhafra region now generate around a quarter
of the UAE’s electricity. All four have been running commercially since September 2024.

You would not know that from a great deal of what is published about them — including, as this is
written, from the UAE Government’s own page on nuclear energy.

Here is what Barakah actually is now, and four things almost every description of it
still gets wrong.

Correction one: Nawah no longer operates Barakah

Practically every article online says the plant is operated by Nawah Energy Company. That has been out
of date since November 2024.

ENEC’s rebrand announcement is unambiguous: “Nawah Energy Company is now called ENEC
Operations and Barakah One Company is called ENEC Commercial.” ENEC’s own plant
operations records have been rewritten accordingly.

Correct present-tense usage is ENEC Operations, formerly Nawah Energy Company. Statements made by the
regulator before November 2024 legitimately say Nawah — they should be quoted as of their date.

Correction two: it is Emirates Nuclear Energy Company

Not Corporation. Every page on ENEC’s site now carries “Emirates Nuclear Energy Company”, and the
rebrand release spells it out. The acronym did not change, which is exactly why the old expansion has
survived everywhere — including in ENEC’s own pre-2024 releases.

Correction three: the government’s own page is out of date

The UAE Government portal’s nuclear energy page still describes the country as “currently building”
four units, still lists Unit 3 in a commissioning phase and Unit 4 at 92 per cent complete, and gives a
carbon avoidance figure that differs from ENEC’s current one.

All four units reached commercial operation between April 2021 and September 2024. We checked the page
on 20 August 2026 and it carries an “updated” stamp from December 2024 — after full-fleet operation was
reached.

We are pointing this out for a practical reason rather than a rhetorical one: it is the second UAE
portal page we have found this month describing a superseded position, after the excise tax page. For
anything time-sensitive, go to the operator or the regulator.

Correction four: “first in the Arab world”, not “first in the Middle East”

The regulator’s phrasing is that the UAE is “the first country in the Arab region to operate a nuclear
power plant”; ENEC says Barakah is the “first multi-unit operating Plant in the Arab World”.

Barakah is not the Middle East’s first nuclear plant — Iran’s Bushehr preceded it. The two claims are
also different from each other: first in the Arab world was Unit 1 in 2021; first multi-unit
operating plant in the Arab world was Unit 2 in 2022.

The dates, which are constantly conflated

Grid connection, first criticality and commercial operation are three different milestones. These are
the commercial operation dates, each from ENEC’s announcement of that milestone.

Two errors are common: dating Unit 1 to August 2020, which is grid connection rather than commercial
operation, and dating Unit 3 to May 2023, which is a filing date rather than ENEC’s announcement. Each
operating licence runs for 60 years.

What is actually there

Four APR1400 units — Generation III+ pressurised water reactors based on the System
80+ design, each producing up to 1,400 MW, with an operational lifespan of at least 60 years. They were
adapted for Gulf conditions with larger cooling pumps and heat exchangers for higher seawater
temperatures, and additional ventilation for heat and airborne sand.

We are not quoting a total plant capacity figure. The “5,600 MW” number in circulation is arithmetic
performed on “up to 1,400 MW” rather than a figure ENEC publishes.

Korea Electric Power Corporation was awarded the prime contract in 2009, after a year-long evaluation
by 75 international experts, in a US$20 billion package covering design, construction and operational
support plus training and human-resource programmes. ENEC itself was established by decree in December
2009 and has been part of ADQ since 2020.

Who owns and runs what

Regulation sits with the Federal Authority for Nuclear Regulation, the UAE’s
independent nuclear regulator, led by Director-General Christer Viktorsson, with more than 77% Emirati
staff. It uses resident inspectors on site and independent environmental monitoring stations. Since 2009
the operator has been subject to more than 500 FANR inspections, alongside over 100 reviews by the World
Association of Nuclear Operators and the IAEA.

ENEC is chaired by H.E. Khaldoon Khalifa Al Mubarak, with H.E. Mohamed Al Hammadi as Managing Director
and CEO.

What it produces

Barakah generates around 40 TWh of electricity a year — around 25% of the UAE’s
electricity needs. ENEC hedges that share differently across its own pages, giving “up to 25%”, “around
25%” and “nearly 25 percent”, so treat it as approximately a quarter rather than a measured constant.

ENEC puts the carbon avoided at 22.4 million tonnes annually, and says the plant contributes 24% of the
UAE’s 2030 nationally determined contribution target. Eighty-five per cent of the clean energy
certificates managed by EWEC are powered by Barakah, with users including ADNOC, Emirates Global Aluminium
and Emirates Steel Arkan.

The financing closed in October 2016 at roughly US$24.5 billion: a US$19 billion direct loan from the
Government of Abu Dhabi, US$2.5 billion from the Export-Import Bank of Korea, US$250 million from five
commercial banks and US$4.7 billion of equity. It was refinanced in July 2023. Construction-phase local
procurement came to US$6.7 billion, with more than 2,000 Emiratis involved in developing the plant.

What comes next

In November 2023 ENEC launched its ADVANCE programme to evaluate small modular reactor
and advanced reactor technologies, for domestic use and international investment. ENEC Consulting sells
the programme-building experience itself — a country that imported a nuclear programme in 2009 now
exporting advice on how to run one.

That is the more interesting story than the megawatts. Our wider coverage of
nuclear power across the GCC sets
Barakah against Saudi Arabia’s plans, and our guides to the
UAE energy mix,
GCC clean
energy investment and Masdar
cover the rest of the generation picture, while our profile of
ADQ under L’IMAD
covers the holding company above it.

Primary sources: ENEC’s announcements of commercial operation at
Unit
1 and
Unit
4; its
November
2024 rebrand release, the source for the Nawah and Barakah One name changes; its
plant
operations,
technology
and company
overview pages; the Federal Authority for Nuclear Regulation on
Unit
4’s operating licence; and the UAE Government portal’s
nuclear
energy page, cited above as the evidence for the staleness point, checked 20 August 2026.