Medina Mosque photo from Shutterstock
The Guardian reports that a top spokesman for
the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has announced plans to transition the nation to 100 percent renewable energy in coming decades.
Prince Turki Al Faisal Al Saud told the
Global Economic Symposium in Brazil that the Kingdom is moving forward with large investments in
renewables, nuclear power, and other alternatives to make the transition to low-carbon sources.
Photo of Prince Turki, credit Nourah, CC BY 2.0.
Prince Turki was a member of a panel discussion at the symposium on “
Reassessing Renewable Energies,” moderated by
The Guardian‘s
environmental correspondent Fiona Harvey herself. She quotes the prince
as saying: “Oil is more precious for us underground than as a fuel
source. If we can get to the point where we can replace fossil fuels and
use oil to produce other products that are useful, that would be very
good for the world. I wish that may be in my lifetime, but I don’t think
it will be.”
Harvey writes that Saudi Arabia is currently powered almost entirely
by fossil fuels — about two-thirds of that is oil and the rest mostly
natural gas. The potential for solar power in sunny Saudi Arabia is very
good, though. In May 2012,
a Saudi representative said that the nation plans to invest over $100 billion to develop 41 gigawatts of solar power by 2032. In April,
the country opened a 388,000-square-foot solar thermal plant in Riyadh, reported to be the world’s largest such plant.
Prince Turki served previously as the director general of Saudi
Arabia’s intelligence agency, as well as ambassdor to the United Kingdom
and the United States. He is founder of the
King Faisal Foundation and chairman of the
King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies.
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