Energy efficiency and low-carbon solutions are emerging as an antidote for Middle Eastern economies that took an estimated $390-billion revenue hit in 2015 due to low oil prices, according to participants in an industry roundtable last month hosted by Lloyd’s Register.
“Low oil prices and rising energy demand will make renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies more attractive across the Middle East,” Utility Dive writes, citing the roundtable report.
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“This is a timely issue, considering the International Energy Agency (IEA) recorded a 25% reduction in field investments in 2015 to $583 billion and said in September this year that oil prices could stay within today’s $50 a barrel range until mid-2017,” said Lloyd’s Register Energy Director Alasdair Buchanan.
Buchanan “said the unnerving outlook for oil-centred economies in the Gulf, such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, and the UAE can be increasingly offset by low-carbon solutions,” the industry publication notes, even though roundtable participants did not see low-carbon technologies threatening fossils’ primacy over the next five decades.
“How energy efficiency and renewables will play a part on the global stage remains to be seen, but, as Lloyd’s report shows, these countries could tap into major resources to compensate for decreasing oil revenue.”
