Role Of Technology In Mitigating Climate Change

By Ali al-Naimi

The following article comprises extracts from a presentation made by Saudi Arabian Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources Ali al-Naimi to the Beijing High Level Conference on Climate Change, organized by the Chinese government and the United Nations on 7-8 November.

We meet at a crucial time in the process of trying to design a practical way forward that concurrently and optimally addresses the challenges of climate change, adequate energy supplies and sustained economic development. We strongly believe that technology will be the key to helping us meet these challenges.

Looking back in history, technology has played a pivotal role in improving the welfare of mankind for centuries. It has brought us the railroad, the automobile, the airplane, the computer and the internet, shrinking distances between countries and civilizations. In the area of environment itself, technology has helped reduce tail pipe emissions in modern vehicles by more than 90% since the advent of the automobile.

We feel that technology should also be given its rightful place in bringing about valuable solutions to climate change challenges. In fact, I firmly believe that when it comes to technologies aimed at mitigating climate change, the world has barely scratched the surface and the research, development and innovation in this area need much greater attention than is presently the case. The list of what we can do includes, but is not limited to, multiple ways of greatly enhancing the efficiency of energy use in a variety of applications, cleaner and futuristic forms of conventional and unconventional fuels, and numerous ways of carbon capture and sequestration, besides many breakthrough technologies that are not even on the horizon today.

The Need For Technology Transfer

The United Nations Framework Convention has identified international cooperation in technology development and technology transfer as key elements in achieving meaningful and sustained mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions and in adapting to climate change and its related adverse impacts. Most recently, the Bali Action Plan, which was adopted last year at the 13th Conference of the Parties, recognized technology as one of the four main building blocks for the long term cooperative agreement to be adopted in Copenhagen by the end of next year.

I would like to reiterate the need to recognize the principles established by the UN Convention on Climate Change, especially the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities between developed and developing countries. It was also stated in the convention that the extent to which developing country parties will effectively implement their commitments under the convention will depend on the effective implementation by developed country parties of their commitments under the convention related to financial resources and transfer of technology.

We are concerned aboutthe lack of practical progress on technology transfer from developed to developing countries, despite a number of studies that have been completed to identify the barriers to such technology transfer. These barriers include access to financing for technology that is currently limited. There are also the issues of capacity building and the transfer of knowledge, expertise as well hardware, besides generally creating enabling conditions. Surely, there are also barriers such as intellectual property rights and others. However, I see no reason why they could not be overcome with adequate political will.

Saudi Arabia would like to stress the need for a new institutional body under the Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC to address all issues related to technology research, development, transfer, and diffusion, as well as capacity building. The Group of 77 and China had earlier proposed the establishment of an executive body for technology. Saudi Arabia feels that this proposal merits serious and expeditious consideration.

The Role Of Fossil Fuels

I would now like to briefly talk about the subject of energy supplies that serve as crucial input to world economic growth, alongside of course the important issue of global warming. Two key points are worth keeping in mind in this regard: first, considering the long-term, the demand for energy is steadily growing in different parts of the world; and second, to help meet this rising demand, fossil fuels represent the main source of energy, which is available in abundance across the world.In fact, most forecasts indicate that fossil fuels will continue to supply the bulk of the world’s energy needs for the foreseeable future.

At the same time, a range of technological and economic issues are keeping alternative sources of energy from making substantial contributions to the global energy portfolio, and their resolution is not anticipated in the short to medium term. In this situation, clearly the most pragmatic strategy to better protect the environment is to concentrate on cleaner and more efficient use of fossil fuels on which we will continue to depend, while concurrently developing alternatives. Accordingly, the calls for moving away from fossil fuels as a means of addressing potential climate change do not represent a practical solution to the global warming issue.

We believe a wide variety of existing and future technologies can enable the continuation of fossil fuels to meet societal needs for sustainable development, and do so in a cleaner manner. The examples of such already available technologies include, but are not limited to, advanced and substantially more efficient conventional engines, clean coal technologies, and carbon capture and storage. This plan of action would contribute to the protection of the global climate while concurrentlyreducing the burden on the global economy and on nations that depend heavily on the export of fossil fuels as well as those that widely use indigenous fossil fuels for their economic development. This is what we call a win-win solution.

I believe it is necessary to promote the universal use of various advanced technological alternatives,in particular under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), to show our seriousness in addressing climate change. At the same time, making the range of mitigating technology alternatives part of the CDM would give further impetus to their development.

To this point, I have referred to three technological aspects of climate change that are a focus of this conference: the research, development and innovation in relevant technologies; technology transfer; and the barriers to technology transfer and its practical utilization. The fourth aspect, which is equally important, concerns international cooperation in these areas at both policy and practical levels. In this regard, collaborative R&D, also involving developing nations, would help build their technology capacity. This in turn would promote the wider use of greenhouse gas technologies in developing countries besides generally assisting in their economic development.

Saudi Initiatives

Saudi Arabia is committed to playing its role in mitigating climate change and supporting technological research and development, and we are undertaking a range of initiatives to which I would like to draw your attention.

At the OPEC summit held in Riyadh last year, the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King 'Abd Allah, pledged $300mn to support research and development related to energy and environment. This was followed by the establishment of the King 'Abd Allah Petroleum Studies and Research Center as one of the world’s preeminent energy and environmental research institutions. The center will focus on current developments, anticipatefuture changes in energy and related environmental arenas, and promote the advancement of environmental technologies, both in Saudi Arabia and more broadly across the world.

While the need for transfer of cutting-edge technologies cannot be overemphasized, we are also actively working on a number of projects, both ourselves and collaboratively, to advance the development of carbon management technologies. Our national oil company, Saudi Aramco, is engaged in researching and testing formulations of futuristic fuels that will help satisfy the needs of advanced designs of internal combustion engines leading to cleaner and more efficient vehicles of the futures.

We also have a pilot project at the planning stage to demonstrate the use of carbon dioxide in enhanced oil recovery as potentially applicable to our oil fields. These fields are still at early stages of depletion and do not require the use of enhanced recovery techniques. Neither can we justify these expensive technologies on the basis of economics. Nevertheless, we intend to undertake the pilot and related research to help advance the global efforts aimed at carbon capture and sequestration.  

Yet we are not limiting our clean environment efforts only to our large endowment of petroleum resources. Just as the kingdom is blessed with highly favorable petroleum geology, we also have a distinct competitive advantage in terms of vast open spans of desert and a lot of sunshine, conditions that are ideal for the promotion of solar energy. Our academic research institutions are giving special attention to this clean energy source for future use in the kingdom and even to exploit its export potential over the long term. 

Saudi Arabia is in the process of establishing and developing a world-leading research institution on the kingdom’s West Coast, the King 'Abd Allah University of Science and Technology. This flagship institution is being built from scratch with the aim of promoting intellectual achievements and creating wealth through innovation. Research on solar energy will be a key part of the university’s research portfolio.

In addition, we will collaborate with leading policy, environmental and technological research centers and institutions worldwide, with the aim of promoting environmentally responsibleuse of hydrocarbons, and contribute to global efforts for environmental protection.

Saudi Arabia is also an active member of the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum (CSLF). Early this year, we held a workshop on carbon management under the Forum’s umbrella, which was well attended by a large number of members and we had very insightful discussions.

Finally, I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the energy and environment related work being undertaken by the National Oil Companies Forum, whose fifth session is currently underway right here in Beijing. The national oil companies of the Peoples Republic of China as well as Saudi Arabia, besides a large number of other national oil companies, are the members of this forum and are participating in its deliberations. I would like to also commend the environment-related efforts of that forum.

Copyright MEES 2008.