DUBAI // Fire risk in flats and villas has been greatly reduced after campaigns to educate the public on the dangers of low-quality electric wiring.
The high cost of copper led to unscrupulous distributors importing wire made from aluminium and steel, which can catch fire during peak use.
“About 60 per cent of cabling imported into the Emirates used to be made of this lower-quality material,” said Colin McKay, general manager of sales and marketing at Ducab, an electrical wire maker owned by the Abu Dhabi and Dubai governments.
“Much of this wiring is used for water heating and air conditioning. We have done our own tests and at peak loads the cables catch fire.
“We have done tests for the fire authority and these aluminium and steel cables always fail at high use. The only thing preventing more fires is that their use doesn’t hit peak load.”
Ducab’s Power Over Fire campaign with Civil Defence is among those that have helped to improve the situation.
“We do tests on cables to see what they are made of, and in the past year we have seen those figures halve primarily due to the media coverage and the education campaign we have been running.”
Last year the Emirates Authority for Standardisation and Metrology (Esma) warned companies importing and distributing the substandard cables that they would be fined if they continued to do so.
New regulations that would require rigorous testing of imported and locally manufactured wiring were also promised.
Those that pass would be given a quality standard mark from the Emirates Conformity Assessment Scheme.
“Esma has not yet brought these regulations in but the effect of the media reports has had an impact on distributors,” said Mr McKay.
“No one wants to end up with cables they will not be able to sell, so many distributors have started to go directly to some of our own suppliers for full flexible cables.”
The use of other materials has become popular in recent years as the price of copper has increased.
“Aluminium is about a third of the cost of copper and steel is just 10 per cent of the cost so there are significant savings to be made by using them,” said Mr McKay.
“There have been improvements made but the next step we would like to see is the new regulations being brought in by Esma.
“That way people will know they are buying a safe product because of the quality mark.”
No one at Esma could be contacted for comment.
nhanif@thenational.ae