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Saudi Arabia Current situation

What is Saudi Arabiaʼs pathway to limit global warming to 1.5°C?

How to citeLast update: December 2022

Emissions profile

Saudi Arabia’s GHG emissions increased by almost fourfold between 1990 and 2017. A majority of this growth can be attributed to the energy sector with an increase from 136 MtCO₂e/yr in 1990 to 537 MtCO₂e/yr in 2017.

The share of the energy sector in Saudi Arabia’s total emissions has remained almost constant since the mid-1980s, accounting for 84% of emissions in 2017. Within the energy sector, the power sector is the single largest source of GHG emissions, accounting for about a one-third share of overall GHG emissions. The power sector is followed by manufacturing and energy industries (21%), and transport (19%).

As one of the world’s largest producer of oil, fugitive emissions form a notable share of the country’s overall emissions (11%). Saudi Arabia’s economy is heavily reliant on oil exports which were expected to contribute nearly 62% of total government revenues in 2020.7 Emissions from industrial processes, waste, and agriculture constitute the remaining share of Saudi Arabia’s GHG emissions.

Under current policies, Saudi Arabia’s GHG emissions are projected to rise 5% above 2015 levels and reach 738 MtCO₂e by 2030.2

1 Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Updated First Nationally Determined Contribution 2021 Submission to UNFCCC. (2021).

2 Climate Action Tracker. Climate Action Tracker. Climate Action Tracker (2022).

3 BBC News. Saudi Arabia commits to net zero emissions by 2060. (2021).

4 International Energy Agency. Energy data and statistics. (2021).

5 Alnatheer, O. The potential contribution of renewable energy to electricity supply in Saudi Arabia. Energy Policy 33, 2298–2312 (2005).

6 BP. Statistical Review of World Energy 2021. (2021).

7 KPMG. Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Budget Report A review of the Saudi Arabia 2020 budget and recent economic developments (2019).

8 IRENA. Renewable Energy Statistics 2021. (2021).

9 General Authority for Statistics. Indicators of Renewable Energy in Saudi Arabia 2018. (2018).

10 Recharge News. We will be pioneering’: Saudi Arabia reveals 50% renewables goal by 2030, but is that realistic? (2021).

11 Climate Action Tracker. Country Analysis: Saudi Arabia September 2020 Update. (2020).

12 Balkan Green Energy News. Saudi Arabia to add 3.7 GW in solar power, achieves world’s lowest price. (2021).

13 Government of Saudi Arabia. The Intended Nationally Determined Contribution of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia under the UNFCCC. (2015).

14 Climate Transparency. Climate Transparency Report 2022 | Climate Transparency. (2022).

15 Bloomberg Green. Saudi Arabia to use 110 billion gas project for blue hydrogen. (2021).

16 TNO. 15 things you need to know about hydrogen. (2021).

17 Climate Transparency. Country Profile: Saudi Arabia. (2021).

18 Utilities Middle East. Saudi Arabia gets first EV charging stations. (2019).

19 Rose, M. Saudi Arabia to launch partial operation of Riyadh Metro by September 2021. Urban Transport News (2021).
fn20. In some of the analysed pathways, the energy sector assumes already a certain amount of carbon dioxide removal technologies, in this case bioenergy carbon capture and storage (BECCS).

21 While global cost-effective pathways assessed by the IPCC Special Report 1.5°C provide useful guidance for an upper-limit of emissions trajectories for developed countries, they underestimate the feasible space for such countries to reach net zero earlier. The current generation of models tend to depend strongly on land-use sinks outside of currently developed countries and include fossil fuel use well beyond the time at which these could be phased out, compared to what is understood from bottom-up approaches. The scientific teams which provide these global pathways constantly improve the technologies represented in their models – and novel CDR technologies are now being included in new studies focused on deep mitigation scenarios meeting the Paris Agreement. A wide assessment database of these new scenarios is not yet available; thus, we rely on available scenarios which focus particularly on BECCS as a net-negative emission technology. Accordingly, we do not yet consider land-sector emissions (LULUCF) and other CDR approaches.

Saudi Arabiaʼs current GHG emissions

MtCO₂e/yr

Displayed values

By sector

  • Power
  • Industry (energy use)
  • Transport
  • Fugitive emissions
  • Buildings
  • Other
  • Industry (processes)
  • Waste
  • Agriculture
  • LULUCF
Energy (84%)⟵ LULUCF negative emissions

By gas

  • CO₂
  • CH₄
  • N₂O
  • Other
081%0

Sectors by gas

Energy
086%0
Agriculture
081%0
Industry (processes)
095%0

Energy system

Rapid economic growth in Saudi Arabia drove a more than fivefold increase in electricity consumption and nearly a fourfold increase in final energy consumption between 1990 and 2018.4 While residential and commercial buildings are the main consumers of electricity in Saudi Arabia, the largest energy consuming sectors are transport and industry.4
As of 2019, 100% of electricity generation was reliant on fossil fuels, with fossil gas contributing 58% and oil accounting for 42%.4 While renewable energy’s installed capacity grew to 443 MW in 2021,8 its overall share still remains low.9

As part of its Vision 2030 strategy, Saudi Arabia aims to diversify its economy, which is at risk due to its heavy reliance on oil revenues. The government aims to install up to 27 GW of renewable energy capacity by 2023 (20 GW PV and 7 GW wind), and up to 58.7 GW by 2030 (40 GW of solar PV, 16 GW of wind and 2.7 GW of concentrated solar power).10,11 In 2021, Saudi Arabia announced signed deals for the construction of seven utility-scale solar power plants with a combined capacity of 3.7 GW, as part of the Vision 2030 strategy.12

Targets and commitments

Economy-wide targets

Target type

Fixed level target

NDC target

  • Reduction of up to 278 MtCO₂e/yr (incl. LULUCF) below BAU by 2030,1 which equates to 524-799 MtCO₂e by 2030 or -25% to +14% 2015 levels by 2030 (excl. LULUCF).11

Long-term target

  • Saudi Arabia does not have an official net zero target.
  • In January 2021, the Energy Minister of Saudi Arabia announced a commitment to “carbon neutrality” at the Future Investment Initiative conference in Riyadh.10 In October 2021, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman pledged to cut Saudi Arabia’s carbon emissions to net zero by 2060 and cut methane emissions by 30% by 2030.3

Sector coverage

EnergyIndustryWasteAgricultureLULUCF

Greenhouse gas coverage

CO₂CH₄NF₃HFCsN₂OSF₆

Sectoral targets

Energy

  • Build the world’s largest carbon capture and use (CCU) plant to capture and purify about 1,500 tons of CO₂ a day for use in petrochemical plants.13
  • Operate a carbon dioxide enhanced oil recovery (CO₂-EOR) demonstration project to assess the viability of CO₂ sequestration in oil reservoirs and any other useful applications. Capture, process and inject 40 million standard cubic feet of CO₂ a day into the Othmaniya oil reservoir.13
  • Collaborate with the members of the Global Methane Pledge initiative to reduce global methane emissions by 30% by 2030 relative to 2020 levels.1

Transport

  • No quantitative targets directly linked to climate action in the transport sector. However, under the Saudi Railway Master Plan, a goal has been set to install 9,900 km of rail network by 2040.11

LULUCF

  • Plant 450 million trees by 2030 as part of a larger, long-term project to plant 10 billion trees.11

Power

  • Install 27.3 GW of renewable energy capacity (20 GW of solar PV and 16 GW of wind) by 2023, and 58.7 GW by 2030 (40 GW of solar PV, 16 GW of wind and 2.7 GW of concentrated solar power).10
  • Increase the share of renewable energy in the power mix to 50% by 2030.1
  • Build and operationalise giga-project called NEOM, which would be one of the world’s largest green hydrogen facilities, powered by four gigawatts of solar and wind. Once onstream in 2025, the plant is expected to produce 650 tons per day of green hydrogen by electrolysis and 1.2 million tons per year of green ammonia.1
  • Maintain a 50% share of natural gas in the electricity generation mix by 2030.1

Buildings

  • Incentivise energy efficiency in government buildings, and private sector investment in energy efficiency services. Retrofit the entire pool of public and governmental assets and facilities which include 2 million street lights, 110,000 government buildings, 35,000 public schools, 100,000 mosques, 2,500 hospitals and clinics.

Footnotes