The hydrogen power project was a 60-40 joint venture with BP and was linked to carbon capture and storage.

"It has been pushed back. It is a very long-term and very complex project. We are awaiting approvals from the government," Frank Wouters, head of power at Masdar, told reporters on the sidelines of  the on going four-day World Future Energy Summit (WFES) that opened in Abu Dhabi on Monday.

The project is "engineered and ready to go," Dominic Emery, chief of staff at BP Alternative Energy, said at the summit. "Abu Dhabi has to be convinced that using the carbon dioxide will be beneficial" before a decision is made to start construction.

The facility could generate power in 2016 or 2017 at the earliest if a decision to build is made soon, Emery said..

While the project awaits the decision of the Abu Dhabi government, the joint venture must responsibly manage its ongoing costs and redeploy some of BP and Masdar resources, a statement from BP said.

Still, Abu Dhabi, among the world's top oil producers, is pushing ahead with investing and developing renewable energy, aiming for renewables to account for 7 percent of total power supply by 2020.