TODAY: Saudi Electricity's dual-tranche green sukuk issuance draws big interest + Egypt’s 500 MW Ras Ghareb wind farm achieves financial close
Good morning, friends. The news cycle shows no signs of slowing down, bringing us plenty of regional updates from across several sectors.
THE BIG CLIMATE STORIES- Saudi Electricity’s dual-tranche green sukuk issuance is drawing huge demand, pulling in over USD 15 bn of subscriptions. Over in Egypt, Red Sea Wind Energy (RSWE) — a JV between Orascom Construction (OC), Japan’s Toyota Tsusho Corporation/Eurus Energy Holdings Corporation, and France’s Engie — has achieved financial close for its 500 MW wind farm near Egypt’s Ras Ghareb.
^^We have all the details on these stories and more in the news well, below.
THE BIG CLIMATE STORY OUTSIDE THE REGION- Delivering a blow to sustainable mobility, Paris votes by a landslide to ban e-scooter rentals: In a rare city-wide referendum on Sunday, 89% of Parisian voters elected to take shared e-scooters off the French capital’s streets as of September. The referendum saw low turnout, with 7.46% of the city’s eligible voters casting ballots.
Could there be recourse? E-scooter operators, including Germany’s Tier, Uber-backed Lime, and Franco-Dutch firm Dott — whose contracts will expire on 1 September and will not be renewed per the consultation’s result — hope the low turnout may persuade French lawmakers to agree to a compromise that would not see an outright prohibition of the EVs. The electric vehicles— known to locals as “trottinettes” since their introduction in 2018 — have proven to be a nuisance to Parisians who regard the devices as hazards that block up public spaces. In spite of imposing speed limits for the EVs, Paris recorded 34 deaths and some 500 serious injuries in 2022 alone from scooters and similar mobility offerings.
The story is getting widespread coverage in the international press: Associated Press | Reuters | Bloomberg | The New York Times | BBC | Financial Times | The Washington Post Deutsche Welle | France 24.
WATCH THIS SPACE #1- The UN will receive ocean mining applications by July: The UN’s International Seabed Authority (ISA) said it would begin accepting permit applications from corporations looking to launch deep-sea mining projects in July following two weeks of negotiations on standards and requirements of the new practice, Reuters reported. The deep-sea mining projects aim to extract critical minerals essential to EV battery production including cobalt, copper, nickel, and manganese, the newswire notes. A notable sticking point in the decision is the lack of a standard mining code that would guide ISA in its application reviewing process, Deutsche Welle notes.
REMEMBER- The UN finalized its High Seas Treaty in March after prolonged negotiations on marine resources: Over 100 countries struck a landmark agreement last month to protect at least 30% of international waters by 2030. The UN High Seas Treaty reportedly took over 36 hours of negotiations before being hammered out. Notable sticking points stalling the consensus included a clause on the share of “marine genetic resources,” with negotiators reportedly locking horns on the division of rewards from new marine resources.
WATCH THIS SPACE #2- Canada says Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act has created “an unlevel playing field”: Washington’s USD 369 bn Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) is waging a “carbon subsidy war” against Canada, the EU, Japan, and other countries scrambling to match the US government’s clean energy handouts, Canada’s Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson tells the Financial Times. The IRA, coupled with the US’ unmatched “fiscal latitude,” could result in fiercer global trade competition between the US and its allies, Wilkinson warned. Canada’s federal budget currently has some USD 13 bn earmarked for clean energy subsidies. On Friday, the US Treasury Department laid out subsidy criteria for the USD 7.5k tax credits of the IRA, announcing that rare earths extracted from freetrade partners — including from Canada, which has lithium, cobalt, nickel, and copper reserves — would benefit from the tax breaks.
WATCH THIS SPACE #3- Ford plans to roll out its EVs in the GCC by 2024, Managing Director for the Middle East and Africa Chris Noel told Asharq Business last week. The specific timeframe of the EVs’ arrival to the region was not disclosed, nor were the specific Ford models that would be on offer. Noel noted that delays in MENA rollouts are attributable to Ford’s current limited production capacity.
THE GREAT DEBATE– The world will need to rely on clean energy bridges like hydrogen and natgas in its transition to renewables, World Energy Council CEO Angela Wilkinson tells CNBC. The transition to renewables won’t be perfect, Wilkinson said, noting that hydrogen and natural gas projects complemented with carbon capture and storage tech will prove essential to meeting climate targets. The International Panel on Climate Change must, when it sets climate targets, take into account that the transition to clean energy is coinciding with industrial and political transitions that require power to fuel growth, Wilkinson said. To meet climate targets, cross-border and cross-sector collaboration will be needed on a range of clean energy and carbon offsetting projects, and significant infrastructural developments upscaling grid connectivity will also be critical to realizing global climate targets, she added.
THE GOOD NEWS- Global gas flaring dropped 5 bn cubic meters in 2022: Global gas flaring levels dipped by some 3% y-o-y in 2022, dropping 5 bn cubic meters — the lowest level since 2010, according to the World Bank’s Global Gas Flaring Tracker report released last week. Global flaring intensity fell to 4.7 cubic meters (cbm) per barrel of oil in 2022 from 5.1 cbm in 2021, indicating a “gradual and sustained decoupling of oil production from flaring,” according to the report. From our neck of the woods, Algeria, Iraq, Libya, and Iran were ranked among the world’s top nine flaring countries in 2022. Between 2014 and 2018, MENA as a whole accounted for 40% of the world’s flaring, with 75% of MENA flaring contributed by Iraq, Iran and Algeria.
REFRESHER- Oil companies worldwide flared 144 bn cbm of gas in 2021, releasing around 400 mn metric tons of CO2 equivalent into the atmosphere. Capturing flare gas and using it to generate power is seen as a solution to that problem. Need a recap on why gas flaring is so bad for the environment? We’ve got you covered.
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The UAE is hosting the International Conference on Green Energy and Environmental Technology (ICGEET) on 18 and 19 April in Dubai. The event will bring together stakeholders from academia, the healthcare industry, and the private sector to discuss energy conservation among other topics.
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The first MENA Solar Conference is accepting applications from published researchers specialized in PV technology until Sunday, 30 April. The Dubai Electricity and Water Authority will be hosting the conference from 15 to 18 November, in conjunction with the Water, Energy, Technology, and Environment Exhibition and the Dubai Solar Show 2023. Researchers can submit their papers here.
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