Last year in July, Saudi Arabia announced plans to launch Dumat Al Jandal, a 500-million US dollar project set to change the way the country produces, consumes, and exports energy. Six months later, the Kingdom has just announced that the contract to build this transformative, mega-project has finally been awarded to a consortium led by France's EDF and Abu Dhabi's Masdar.
According to reports, the group won the bid to build a 400 MW utility-scale wind farm that will be located in Al Jouf region, north of the Kingdom, and that will generate enough power to supply up to 70,000 Saudi households. As Saudi Arabia continues to push to diversify its energy sector, Dumat Al Jandal is indeed a first for a nation that has come to be known for decades as the world's top oil exporter.
"The project will be Saudi Arabia's first utility-scale wind farm," the ministry said. "This milestone represents another significant step... towards creating a diversified power sector mix."
As reported by Daily Star Lebanon, the announcement of this landmark project came one day after Saudi Arabia stated that its oil reserves, already the second largest in the world (Venezuela being the first), are even bigger than previously thought. According to the Kingdom’s energy ministry, oil reserves stood at 263.2 billion barrels at the end of 2018, “up from the figure of 261 billion barrels that has been used for almost three decades.”
Although Saudi Arabia’s oil reserves show no sign of dwindling, the country has been committed towards creating sustainable sources of energy, heavily focusing over the last couple of years on diversifying its industries and moving away from its dependency on oil, under the objectives laid in its Vision 2030 national strategy. In line with its efforts, the Dumat Al Jandal project falls perfectly within the country’s goal to have 10 percent renewable energy by the year 2023.
In addition to establishing wind farms, Saudi Arabia has also been investing in other forms of energy production. Last year, for instance, the Ministry of Energy, Industry, and Mineral Resources announced at the 11th annual Arab Energy Forum in Morocco that it is working in partnership with the country’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), Japan’s multinational conglomerate SoftBank, and other related authorities in Saudi Arabia to implement several multi-billion-dollar projects related to solar energy. The goal of these projects is to produce 200 megawatts of electricity from solar energy by 2030.
