Oman’s decarbonisation vision to take centre-stage at Ministerial Dialogue

A key ‘Ministerial Dialogue’, co-hosted by the Sultanate and due to take place next week, will feature top officials from Oman, among other international figures, deliberating on two principal themes: Clean energy technologies to decarbonise local energy supply, and the potential for low carbon export industries.

The event, slated for September 9, has been jointly organised by Oman’s Ministry of Energy and Minerals and the International Energy Agency (IEA), a Paris-based international energy forum comprised of 29 industrialised countries under the Organisation for Economic Development and Cooperation (OECD).

The Ministerial Dialogue – co-hosted by Oman’s Minister of Energy and Minerals Dr Mohammed bin Hamad al Rumhy and IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol – will seek to address the particular challenges that energy transitions present for economies in the Middle East and North Africa, as well as the tangible opportunities for those countries to increase economic resilience and prosperity for the region and its people.

In further details about the Ministerial Dialogue, shared by the IEA over the weekend, it was revealed that Ali Allawi, Iraq’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, will deliver the keynote address at the start of the virtual event.

This will be followed by two sessions, the first of which, focusing on ‘Opportunities for clean energy technologies to decarbonise local energy supply’, will be moderated by Salim bin Nasser al Aufi, Under-Secretary of Oman’s Ministry of Energy and Minerals

“This session will determine the opportunities in renewables and energy efficiency that could be available to all producers that would help decarbonise the local energy mix at the same time as creating some local value to the economy,” stated the IEA in its programme agenda.

IEA Deputy Executive Director Mary Warlick will moderate the second session, spotlighting the theme, ‘Ensuring competitiveness through low carbon export industries’. Deliberations during this session will “will seek to address ways that producers can reduce carbon intensity of their current supply; size the potential for low/zero-carbon fuels; and explore ways for countries to promote local value chains to ensure that the energy transitions are promoting economic diversification”, according to IEA.

Of late, non-OPEC member Oman has found itself increasingly in the global spotlight for a number of pertinent reasons. It is credited with playing an important role in helping strengthen the OPEC+ alliance – the coalition of 23 oil producing and exporting countries that include non-OPEC producers as well – that has collaborated to help buoy global oil prices following the most recent oil price collapse.

Oman is also on the frontlines of a global drive championing hydrogen as a green alternative to fossil-based carbon-emitting fuel resources largely responsible for climate change.

Already, a number of world-scale green hydrogen ventures are planned for implementation in the Sultanate for the domestic and export markets at a cost of several billions of dollars.