Dubai Strategic Sewerage Tunnels (DSST)
Wastewater conveyance tunnel, About 75 km of deep tunnels (Bur Dubai and Jebel Ali about 50 km, Deira about 25 km) with 140 km of link sewers and two terminal pumping stations, up to 90 m deep in United Arab Emirates.
In tender
The record
- Country
- United Arab Emirates
- Location
- Dubai
- Coordinates
- —
- Technology
- Wastewater conveyance tunnel
- Capacity
- About 75 km of deep tunnels (Bur Dubai and Jebel Ali about 50 km, Deira about 25 km) with 140 km of link sewers and two terminal pumping stations, up to 90 m deep
- Capital cost
- US$8 billion
- Stage
- In tender
- Owner or client
- Dubai Municipality
- Contractor
- —
- Operator
- —
- Finance
- Public-private partnership, design-build-finance-operate-maintain with concessions of 25 to 35 years; estimated initial capital expenditure AED 30 billion (about US$8 billion) and lifecycle cost AED 80 billion
- Award or start year
- 2025
- Commissioned
- —
Record last checked 2026-09-18.
History
- 2016
Parsons appointed by Dubai Municipality for design and programme management
- 2024-04
Flooding in Dubai raises the urgency of the scheme
- 2025-04
Requests for proposals issued for the first two packages
- 2025-11
Packages reconfigured and retendered
- 2026-06
Bidders selected for Package W (about US$3 billion) and Package J (about US$2 billion)
Sources
6 references
Every field in the record above is taken from the references below. A field that none of them confirms prints as a dash.
- AGBI, Dubai takes step forward on $22bn sewage tunnel network (10 April 2025). agbi.com.
- Dubai Municipality issued requests for proposals for the first two contracts; estimated initial capital expenditure AED 30 billion (US$8 billion) and total lifecycle cost AED 80 billion per Tribe Advisory; two main tunnels totalling 75 km with 140 km of supporting tunnels up to 90 m deep, six packages tendered as PPPs with 25 to 35 year concessions.
- Engineering News-Record, Dubai Selects Teams for Key Contracts of $22B Sewer Tunnel Megaproject (1 July 2026). enr.com.
- In early June 2026 Dubai selected a consortium of Etihad Water & Electricity with Tamasuk Holding and Alkhorayef Water & Power to bid for Package W (about US$3 billion) and a group led by Vision Invest with Suez to bid for Package J (about US$2 billion); the Links package covering more than 200 km of tunnels remains in tender; packages were reconfigured and retendered in November 2025; more than 150 legacy pumping stations are to be decommissioned.
- Parsons, Dubai Strategic Sewerage Tunnels. parsons.com.
- MENA Water Review major projects register and PPP pipeline — compiled from procurer publications, development-bank project pages and trade reporting; each record names its source.
Parsons was appointed by Dubai Municipality in 2016 for design and programme and construction management; project value stated as 3.2 billion.