Paris (AsiaNews/Agencies) – Saudi Arabia, the world largest oil exporter, plans to develop solar power plants, developing cleaner energy as a good alternative to oil.
“For a country like Saudi Arabia . . . one of the most important sources of energy to look at and to develop is solar energy," Saudi Energy Minister Ali al-Nuaimi told French oil newsletter Petrostrategies, adding that one “of the research efforts that we are going to undertake is to see how we make Saudi Arabia a centre for solar energy research and hopefully over the next 30 to 50 years we will be a major megawatt exporter. In the same way we are an oil exporter, we can also be an exporter of power.”
At present Saudi Arabia produces more than 10 million barrels of crude oil a day, but in response to warnings by environmentalists and scientists Saudi Arabia and other countries want to invest in carbon capture and storage programmes to develop technology allowing carbon dioxide to be extracted from the atmosphere and stored underground.
Gulf OPEC members pledged 750 million dollars (500 million euros) to a new fund to tackle global warming through financing research for clean technologies.