Enlarge image
Mohammed bin Salman in November 2019
Photo: Saudi Royal Palace / AFP
Saudi Arabia apparently wants to become climate neutral by 2060.
This was announced by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in a speech at the beginning of the kingdom's first climate forum.
The country is a leader in oil exports and is considered to be one of the largest polluters in the world.
But in the meantime the country has pushed ahead with the expansion of renewable energies.
In nine years, half of the energy demand is to be met from renewable sources. In addition, the country wants to plant billions of trees. However, climate neutrality does not have to mean that Saudi Arabia will reduce its oil production or oil exports. The venture is only about the country's emissions - and not those that arise when the kingdom's oil is burned abroad, Bloomberg reports. According to this, the state-owned oil company Aramco is even in the process of increasing its production capacities, from 12 million to 13 million barrels per day.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Russia had also announced that they would reduce their emissions.
The UAE want to be climate neutral by 2050, Russia by 2060. Bin Salman said, according to Bloomberg, the world could not function without fossil fuels and hydrocarbons.
The World Climate Conference begins in Glasgow, Scotland, in just over a week.
The main issue here is how the goal formulated in the Paris Agreement can still be achieved, namely to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees compared to the pre-industrial era.
Saudi Arabia has so far been one of the brakes on global climate protection.
The BBC recently reported a data leak, according to which several states, including Saudi Arabia, had asked the UN to downplay the fact that they should turn away from fossil fuels.
According to UN data, more than 130 countries have set themselves the goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050.
Germany wants to be climate neutral by 2045.
kha / Reuters / AFP
