Qatar’s EcoTransit launches the country’s first electric vehicle brand

Good morning, wonderful people. The new cycle has slowed once more, but there are a couple of stories making waves in the region.

THE BIG CLIMATE STORY- Qatar’s smart transport company EcoTransit has launched Vim, the country’s first electric vehicle brand, and the Commercial Bank of Dubai has hired banks to arrange its inaugural USD-denominated green bond issuance.

^^ We have the details on these stories and more in the news well, below.

THE BIG CLIMATE STORY OUTSIDE THE REGION- There isn’t one specific story dominating the international headlines this morning, but Germany said it will launch a 15-year, EUR 50 bn program aimed at helping its struggling industrial sector shift to climate-neutral technologies. The program will be open to firms with at least 10 kilotons of carbon emissions, including heavily polluting industries such as steel, chemicals, cement, and others. The government hopes to slash 350 mn tons of carbon emissions by 2045 through the initiative, accounting for a third of the industry’s goal. “We are targeting the most emitting companies,” German Economy Minister Robert Habeck was quoted as saying. The story was picked up by Reuters and Bloomberg.

---

ENTERPRISE IS LOOKING FOR SMART, TALENTED PEOPLE of all backgrounds to help us build some very cool new things. Enterprise — the essential morning read on all the important news shaping business and the economy in Egypt and the region — is looking for writers, reporters and editors to help us build out new publications. Today, we run four daily Egypt and MENA-focused publications, five weekly industry verticals, and a weekend lifestyle edition designed to make our readers feel just a bit smarter.

We have tons more in the pipeline — come help us build new publications. We offer the chance to work in a fast-paced newsroom on a broad range of topics and in a variety of formats. Our goal is simple: To create value for our growing community of >250k daily readers by telling stories that matter.

Journalists looking to explore business, finance and economic stories are welcome. So are recent journalism school graduates.

That said, we're looking for gifted story-tellers from all walks of life and across all professions, as long as they show a keen interest in learning to write about the stories, topics, businesses, and figures moving markets. Egyptian and foreign nationals alike are welcome to apply. So are job-switchers: If you’re an equities analyst tired of the rat race, we’re a great place to come work.

NEVER WORKED IN A NEWSROOM BEFORE? We have the Enterprise Business Writing Development Program. Whether you are a recent graduate, an industry vet, or looking to switch careers, the Enterprise Business Writing Development Program will give you the tools you need to tell the most important stories to our audience of C-suite officials, government ministers, diplomats, financiers, investors and entrepreneurs.

During the program you will learn:

• The key news stories and trends shaping business and the economy in Egypt and the region, across various sectors;
• Business and finance for non-finance people: Whether it's industry jargon or key concepts or simply how to read a balance sheet;
• How to construct an Enterprise story: From idea formulation down to the structure, style and tone of writing;
• How to develop sources that will give you the key insights needed to tell a complete story;
• How to communicate these stories with the confidence and language of an insider.

Not an internship program — a career: The three-month program will see full-time, paid participants take part in workshops and lectures from veteran business journalists, while also working on and filing stories that will run on any of our publications. Those who have successfully completed the program, will then be given long-term job offers.

Apply directly to jobs@enterprisemea.com and mention “writing development program” in your subject line.

---

OVER IN COPLAND- Oil and gas should be on the table of discussions at COP28, COP28 Director-General Majid Al Suwaidi told Axios in an interview published Monday. “We can't have an exclusive conversation that misses out on the whole constituency who are … best placed to help you solve the problem,” he said. “We're asking them to come and say what they're going to do to address the climate challenge,” Al Suwaidi added. He said the incoming COP presidency is concerned about having a “transparent” process. He responded to criticism over the COP presidency for its oil and gas ties, stressing that “we understand why that may appear to people outside, as you know, challenging.”

But the key issue of the phaseout of fossil fuels might not make it on the COP28 agenda, UN Climate Executive Secretary Simon Stiell told the Associated Press on Monday. The phaseout “is something that is at the top of every discussion or most discussions that are taking place,” Stiell said. “It is an issue that has global attention. How that translates into an agenda item and a (climate talks) outcome we will see,” he added. He said he can’t promise to have the topic on the agenda during climate negotiations, stressing that it is up to COP28 President-Designate Sultan Al Jaber to decide.

ALSO- Draft decisions to be adopted at COP28 will be discussed at the Bonn Climate Change Conference: Discussions and negotiations on the global stocktake, global goal on adaptation, just transition, loss and damage, and the mitigation work program will feature in this year’s 10-day Bonn Climate Change Conference, which kicked off yesterday in Bonn, Germany. The conference will see delegations come together to hash out the details of proposals to be presented at COP28. The conference held a number of mandated events yesterday including, the Glasgow-Sharm El-Sheikh work programme on adaptation, a workshop on country-driven strategies for Just Transition and Economic Diversification, and the first investment-focused event under the Sharm el-Sheikh mitigation ambition and implementation work program. The majority of the sessions will be available to watch live.

---

WATCH THIS SPACE #1- The WB is facing pressure from Barbados: The World Bank is facing increasing pressure to provide USD 100 bn in capital for climate and development finance to aid developing countries fight against climate change, the Financial Times reports. The proposal — put forward by Barbados’ Prime Minister Mia Mottley — would help reduce “excessive risks” that developing countries have to take to borrow to fund green investments. The proposal comes amid efforts to revive the Bridgetown Initiative — a plan to reform how rich nations extend development finance to developing countries — and will be discussed at The Summit for a New Global Financial Pact in Paris later this month. While the World Bank’s largest shareholders, led by the US, have previously rejected calls for more funding, Germany’s Minister for Economic Cooperation and Development Svenja Schulze told the FT that the bank is open to considering the proposal, the news outlet said.

Get Enterprise Climate

***

YOU’RE READING ENTERPRISE CLIMATE, the essential MENA publication for senior execs who care about the world’s most important industry. We’re out Monday through Thursday by 5am Cairo / 5am Riyadh / 6am UAE.

EXPLORE MORE OF ENTERPRISE ON THE WEB — tap or click here to read EnterpriseAM, EnterprisePM, and The Weekend Edition on our powerful new website packed with reader-friendly features.

Were you forwarded this email? Get your own subscription without charge here or reach out to us on climate@enterprisemea.com with comments, suggestions and story tips.
***

CIRCLE YOUR CALENDAR-

Saudi Arabia will host the Arab-Chinese Business Conference next Sunday, 11 June and Monday, 12 June in Riyadh. The conference will bring together CEOs, business leaders, investors, and entrepreneurs from the Middle East and China to collaborate on new trade and investment initiatives in different sectors, including renewables and minerals. A panel discussion titled Clean Energy and Renewables – Pathways to Emissions Reduction is scheduled on the first day, according to the program (pdf). The second day will focus on the localization of renewable energy and on value chain opportunities in mining.

The UAE will host The Arab Green Summit on Tuesday, 13 June to Wednesday, 14 June in Dubai. The two-day summit will bring together industry players and experts for conversations on climate change and sustainability and solutions for concurrent climate-related issues in the region. Key themes to be addressed during the summit include industry decarbonization, renewable and clean energy potential and implementation, sustainable building and construction and others.

Morocco will host the Bloomberg New Economy Gateway Africa on Tuesday, 13 June to Wednesday, 14 June in Marrakech. The event will bring together stakeholders from the private and public sector to discuss the world’s most pressing topics and assess potential solutions. Those include the impact of a decelerating global economy, spiking food and energy prices, supply-chain shocks and risks of distress among sovereign borrowers.

France will host The Summit for a New Global Financial Pact on Thursday, 22 June to Friday, 23 June in Paris. The two-day summit will bring together heads of states and heads of multilateral development banks, international organizations, the private sector and international NGOs to shape a new finance “toolbox” and “pave the way towards a more balanced financial partnership between the north and south.” It will also see new agreements in a bid to relieve debt distress and allow countries to access additional financing to invest in sustainable development and slash emissions.

Check out our full calendar on the web for a comprehensive listing of upcoming news events and news triggers.

Qatar’s smart transport company EcoTransit has launched Vim, the country’s first electric vehicle brand, QNA reports. The EV brand — which will be exclusive Qatari intellectual property — already has several preliminary designs, according to QNA. A five-door and five-seater SUV VIM VX 50 with a battery size of 72 kWh and a four-door and five-seater VIM VS 30 sedan were revealed during an event, according to Qatari media reports. A third seven-to-nine seat VIM P 100 van also made its debut.

And that’s not all: EcoTransit plans to invest in establishing the region’s first center for the adoption of electric vehicles, which should ensure that the vehicles comply with global and Gulf standards. EcoTransit is also manufacturing electric mass transit buses and assembling electric vehicles.

All part of a Qatari EV drive: Qatar’s Transport Ministry announced in April a goal to turn 35% of its vehicle fleet and 100% of public transport buses electric by 2030. Fitch Solutions said it expects strong growth in EV adoption within the next decade on the back of the government’s electrification drive despite the market still being young.

Another day, another UAE green bond issuance: The Commercial Bank of Dubai (CBD) has hired banks to arrange its inaugural USD-denominated green bond issuance, Reuters reports, citing a bank document it has seen. A five-year benchmark-sized issuance — usually set at a minimum USD 500 mn — will follow, subject to market conditions, according to the newswire.

Advisors: The document showed that Citibank, Emirates NBD Capital, First Abu Dhabi Bank, HSBC, JPMorgan, Natixis, and Standard Chartered have been hired by CBD for the debut issuance and were asked to hold investor calls this week.

REMEMBER- Interest in green bonds and green sukuk has been on the rise in the region in recent months ahead of COP28 in the UAE. The most recent issuance was by the UAE’s largest bank, First Abu Dhabi Bank, which issued a USD 600 mn five-year green bond last week. The issuance was the third successful public issuance in the USD market by the bank and the first by a MENA financial institution this year. In April, the UAE’s state-owned Abu Dhabi National Energy Company (Taqa) raised an aggregate USD 1.5 bn in a dual-tranche green bond issuance that was almost 10x oversubscribed at a final order under the company’s new Green Finance Framework.

Amnah-led consortium to invest USD 6 bn in Oman green hydrogen facility: Amnah Group — a consortium comprising Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP), Blue Power Partners (BPP), and Al Khadra — will invest c. USD 6 bn in a green hydrogen facility in Oman, according to a statement. The timeline for the project’s operational launch has not been disclosed, but CIP partner Karsten Plauborg noted that the consortium will hammer out the development plan for the production plant “in the coming period.”

The details: The consortium will establish a green hydrogen production facility spanning some 320 sq km in Oman’s Al Wusta governorate, producing 215k tons of green hydrogen annually, primarily for use in green steel plants in the Port of Duqm, the statement notes. The facility will also be powered by 4.5 GW of renewable energy.

Who is doing what: CIP will leverage its experience in the construction of renewables projects, BPP will contribute with its expertise in modeling and quantifying solar and wind resources, and Al Khadra will use its local networking power to form engineering, procurement, and construction partnerships to bring the project online, according to the statement.

The investment plan: CIP says it is actively looking to onboard new investors, beginning with “wind and solar measurement campaigns to make sure we understand exactly the quality of the resources. And we will also engage, at a deeper level, with banks to fully understand the bankability issues that we will face for the project,” Plauborg said.

REMEMBER- Amnah’s investment is part of a wider USD 20 bn agreement: Hydrom — owned by Energy Development Oman — signed two other agreements last week granting blocks of land for planned green hydrogen plants worth an estimated USD 16 bn. The three projects — including the Amnah project — will have a cumulative production green hydrogen generation volume of 500k tons annually.

Regional investment in CCUS is picking up: The recent conclusion of Carbon Capture, Utilization and Storage (CCUS) Forum hosted by Qatar in Lusail City marked an increased interest in CCUS investments and new tech as the public and private sector look for new ways to reach decarbonization targets. COP28 President-Designate Sultan Al Jaber’s call to reduce fossil fuel “emissions” rather than “production” in his opening speech at the Petersberg Climate Dialogue in Berlin emphasized the importance of carbon capture and storage in the global need to curb global warming.

Agreements are picking up this year: Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman signed an agreement with Azerbaijan to develop new potentials in CCUS projects and Adnoc said it will allocate USD 15 bn to decarbonization projects such as CCUS by 2030. Three facilities developed by Saudi Aramco, Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc), and QatarEnergy together account for around 10% of global CO2 captured each year, according to a 2022 status report by the Global CCS Institute. Analysis by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries forecasted that the CCUS market in the region will reach 50 mn metric tons per year in a decade compared to around 4 mn metric tons per year in 2021, according to S&P Global.

Aramco is stepping up its game with an ambitious project to launch in 2027: Aramco is developing one of the world’s largest carbon capture and storage hubs with the capacity to store up to 9 mn tons of CO2 a year by 2027, and 44 mn tons by 2035. The carbon will be captured from Jubail Industrial City, in partnership with oil services giant SLB and chemical company Linde. The company is also working on drilling a first-of-its-kind carbon saline aquifer that can store 100% of the carbon injected in it, according to a statement. Adnoc’s aquifer will have the capacity to sequester — another word for capture and store — a minimum of 18k tons of CO2 annually from Fertiglobe’s blue hydrogen production plants.

And other companies are trailing behind: QatarEnergy and GE signed an MoU to develop a carbon capture roadmap for Qatar’s energy sector. Japan’s Mitsubishi is working with Aluminium Bahrain (Alba) to capture CO2 from its smelter and flue gas plants, according to S&P. Both projects could ultimately capture 500k to 1 mn metric tons per year by 2030.

EOR under fire? 88% of global CO2 captured is used to boost Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) according to a IHS Markit report cited by Vox. Climate groups pushing for the phaseout of oil and gas criticize EOR given its role in increasing fossil fuel production, as Aramco plans to use its carbon capture products to help expand its oil production capacity to 13 mn barrels per day by 2027. Aramco, however, has stated that EOR will only improve the effectiveness of production, rather than increase its volume, according to Upstream.

A tool to decarbonize: Over the past two decades, around 54–57% of total greenhouse gas emissions came from the top 20 oil refining companies, making the industry the third largest source of GHG emissions. CCS holds great potential to reduce those emissions as the world awaits a possible oil and gas phasing out plan during COP28.

And there’s new tech on the way: Direct air capture — the capture of carbon directly from the atmosphere rather than from the source of the emission — has been the target of much research, but a future energy scenario modeled by Shell revealed that capturing carbon from the air proved to be too energy intensive for it to play a significant role in reaching global climate goals. A recently leaked UN note said that direct air capture “does not contribute to reducing the global mitigation costs.” US Climate Envoy John Kerry recently said that governments should stop relying on potential advancements in carbon dioxide removal technologies.

The fastest electric car in the world, the Rimac Nevera, will be available in the UAE market starting 2024, The National reports. Local distributor Al Habtoor Motors is currently offering sales visits to prospective buyers of the USD 2.2 mn car, the outlet adds. The Nevera set 23 performance records last month, including hitting 400 kph in 29.93 seconds.

The specs: The two-seater EV has a WLTP range of up to 550 km and an impressive power output of up to 1.4k kW, Rimac’s website notes. The EPA range, however, calculates Nevara’s range at a less outstanding 330 km, which Car and Driver explains is the cost of having a power output that is much higher than that of a Formula One car. The Nevara produces 1.9k horsepower, and has a 1.7k pound-force foot of torque. The EV packs an energy-dense battery with one of the highest charging performance of up to 500 kW.

Small production, high value: Rimac has only manufactured 150 of the Nevera given its high production value. The engineers manufacture everything — from powertrain components to composites and in-car controls — at the company’s headquarters in Croatia, the website explains.

Transition finance is emerging as a top trend for hard-to-abate industries looking to slash emissions and improve energy efficiency, Bloomberg reports. Transition finance emerged on the scene on the back of concerns by banks and investors about greenhouse gas emissions from businesses they finance. These concerns have made companies in highly-polluting industries unable to access capital markets, which they argue blocks funds needed to use greener technologies in emerging markets. However, critics say transition financing could be subject to greenwashing or mislead stakeholders about a company’s environmental impact.

Who is leading the pack? The world’s top polluter China is creating a transition taxonomy for several sectors including steel and agriculture, while Japan is seeing a boom in corporate transition bonds, Bloomberg writes. Tokyo plans to issue JPY 20 tn (c. USD 154 bn) on sovereign transition bonds over the next decade. All in all, some USD 18 bn in transition bonds have been issued globally since 2019, thanks to China and Japan. Total issuance from Asia more than doubled in 2022 in comparison with a year earlier. The bonanza is also seen elsewhere, with Canada, whose top emissions sources are oil and gas, mulling a transition-financing label for investments in these sectors.

OTHER STORIES WORTH KNOWING ABOUT THIS MORNING-

• Ghanaian clothes traders visited Brussels last week to lobby for EU legislation that would force the European fashion industry to stop dumping tons of textiles in the West African country. About 40% of the textiles of the 100 tons of clothing that arrive in Ghana’s second-hand markets are discarded as waste. (The Guardian)
• Rock powder — or “rock flour” — from under Greenland’s giant ice sheet can trap some 250 kg of CO2 per ton of powder and provide essential nutrients when applied to crop fields. Scientists calculated that 27 mn tons of CO2 could be captured if rock flour is used on all of Denmark’s farmland, which is roughly equivalent to the country’s total annual CO2 emissions. (The Guardian)
• A hall at Washington University has been built using mass timber as its main construction material, with an estimated carbon footprint that is 76% less than that of a traditional concrete-steel structure. (Bloomberg)

UAE’s Masdar successfully installed the first 4.7 MW wind turbine at its 500 MW wind farm in Uzbekistan, the company said. Masdar reached financial close for the Zarafshan Wind Farm in September, raising USD 600 mn to build the plant that is expected to power 500k homes and replace 1.1 mn tons of CO2 annually. Commercial operations are expected to start by the end of 4Q 2024.

Omantel launches its inaugural sustainable finance framework: Oman Telecommunications Company (Omantel) — the leading internet provider in the sultanate — has unveiled its ESG framework enabling the telecommunications firm to access green and sustainability-linked bonds as well as green sukuks, according to a statement. The firm’s newly announced framework is in line with the International Capital Market Association’s green, social, and sustainability loan principles, and falls under the UK-based Loan Market Association and the Asia Pacific Loan Market Association and the Loan Syndications & Trading Association's green loan guidelines, the statement notes. Under the framework, the telecoms company will fund projects supporting energy efficiency in its sector including renewables deployments.

Europe may battle with yet another climate-driven drought this year: EU lawmakers are preparing for a potential climate-induced crisis this summer as Mediterranean countries including Italy recorded high temperatures this spring typically experienced in summer months, CNBC writes. The continent experienced soaring temperatures over the past winter — 10-20°C higher from France to Russia, taking a visible toll on countries like the Netherlands, Denmark, Poland, Czechia’s waterways, and was dubbed the “the most extreme event ever seen in European climatology,” according to a report by climatologist Maximiliano Herrera published in the Washington Post. The winter highs are leading researchers to predict a similar drought crisis similar to the one Europe saw last summer, which was the highest it faced in centuries, CNBC notes.

REMEMBER- Europe experienced its worst drought in 500 years in 2022, according to analysis by experts from the European Union’s Joint Research Center. Among other irregularities, the drought saw dozens of sunken Nazi WWII warships that were once submerged deep in the Danube river resurface near the town of Prahavo in Serbia last summer.

The middle and upper stratosphere — the second lowest layer in the atmosphere — is cooling dramatically because of rising CO2 levels, Yale Environment 360 said, citing a study published last month in the journal PNAS by pioneering climate modeler Ben Santer. The study used new satellite data to build on another recent study that illustrated how the mesosphere and lower thermosphere — the layers above the stratosphere — cooled by 1.7°C. The research estimated that by the end of the century, these zones would cool by 7.5°C, two to three times faster than the average warming expected at ground level.

How does the upper atmosphere get colder? The heat that we emit does not all stay in the troposphere — the lowest layer of the atmosphere, Yale Environment explains. When the heat spreads upwards, it escapes into space, which, combined with the trapping of heat in the lower atmosphere, results in a rapid cooling of the upper layers. The cooling of the upper air also causes it to contract. One study found that the depth of the stratosphere has diminished by about 1% since 1980, and another found that the mesosphere and lower thermosphere contracted by almost 1.3 km between 2002 and 2019.

Why this matters: This contraction means the upper atmosphere is becoming less dense, which in turn reduces drag on satellites and other objects in low orbit, causing space junk — bits of equipment of various sorts left behind in orbit — to stick around longer and increases the risk of collisions with satellites.