Saudi Arabia announces three projects to advance climate action at SGI Forum

Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Energy, announced the inauguration of three new projects that will boost the kingdom’s national and regional climate action.

The announcement was made on the second day of the Saudi Green Initiative (SGI) Forum, held on the sidelines of COP27 in Egypt.

The projects include the Circular Carbon Economy (CCE) Knowledge Hub.

The kingdom is launching the platform – as part of its commitments to the Middle East Green Initiative (MGI) – to facilitate regional collaboration in CCE technologies, and share information, best practices and learnings that will support the region-wide implementation of NDCs, helping achieve the ambitious targets set under MGI.

Saudi Arabia will collaborate with the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) to establish a regional centre to advance emissions reduction.

This centre will provide opportunities for regional collaboration to accelerate emissions reduction and facilitate the implementation of the CCE. 

Saudi Arabia is also working with UNFCCC to host the next MENA Climate Week in 2023. Taking place in the lead up to COP28 (in the UAE), this event will bring together key regional and global stakeholders to advance climate action.

During the SGI Forum, the Minister of Energy also announced the signing of a Joint Development Agreement with Saudi Aramco and its partners for the largest planned carbon capture and storage (CCS) hub in the world. The centre in Jubail Industrial City will start operating by 2027 and be able to extract and store 9 million mtpa of CO₂ in its first phase, supporting Saudi Arabia’s aim to extract, use and store 44 mtpa of CO₂ by 2035.

Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman witnessed the launch of two pilot projects for carbon capture and utilisation led by KAUST, NEOM and SEC, Alsafwa Cement Company and Abdullah Hashim Industrial Gases & Equipment. Additionally, Ma’aden and Gulf Cryo announced an agreement to enhance the implementation of the circular carbon economy framework and reduce emissions.

Over the past year, Saudi Arabia has accelerated the pace of its climate action. The kingdom will achieve the SGI target of placing 30 per cent of its land and sea under protection by 2030, and plant over 600 million trees within the same timeframe, an increase of over 150 million trees from the initial goal to plant 450 million by 2030.

The country’s pledge to reduce emissions by 278 mtpa by 2030 through the CCE approach is on track. In line with the kingdom’s ambition to achieve 50 per cent power generation capacity from renewables by 2030, 13 new renewable energy projects with a total capacity of 11.4GW, at an estimated investment value of $9bn (SAR34bn), are under development. The projects, once operational, are set to reduce around 20 million tons of CO2e per year.