Dubai buildings with solar rooftops have nearly doubled to 435 in only 10 months as the emirate works to have all rooftops fitted with photovoltaic (PV) panels. More than 200 new buildings have been equipped with solar power since November with a total capacity of 15.6 megawatts as part of the Shams Dubai initiative, the Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (Dewa) said on Wednesday. The initiative, launched in 2015, aims to have solar panels on all rooftops across the emirate by 2030. <strong>________________</strong> Read more: <strong>________________</strong> <span data-atex-cstyle="$ID/[No character style]">"Shams Dubai allows customers to avoid using very expensive power storage systems by connecting the PV panels to the network," said Saeed Al Tayer, the managing director and chief executive of Dewa.</span> <br/> <br/> <span data-atex-cstyle="$ID/[No character style]">The power generated from the solar panels will cover the customer's needs, but under a net metering system, any surplus power will be fed back into the grid with a credit seen on the customer's electricity bill.</span> <span data-atex-cstyle="$ID/[No character style]">To help residential and businesses consider solar, Dewa created a solar calculator last month,</span><span data-atex-cstyle="$ID/[No character style]">located on its website. </span><span data-atex-cstyle="$ID/[No character style]">The calculator helps provide customers with comparisons to help promote the installation of solar power. </span> <span data-atex-cstyle="$ID/[No character style]">Other </span><span data-atex-cstyle="$ID/[No character style]">tools available to those interested in installing solar panel systems include Green Deal Dubai, a crowdsourcing platform to help drive down the costs of solar thanks to providing an aggregated list of<br/> providers.</span> <span data-atex-cstyle="$ID/[No character style]">Dubai is targeting to generate 7 per cent of its total power output from clean energy sources by 2020, 25 per cent by 2030 and 75 per cent by 2050.</span><br/> <span data-atex-cstyle="$ID/[No character style]">The Dewa-owned Etihad Energy Services (Esco) installed 144 solar PV panels totaling 37.5 kilowatts on the utility's centre in Hatta, the utility announced this week. The company will also add solar PV systems to 640 villas in the area by the end of the next year.</span><br/>