Mubadala’s UAE Investment chief Musabbeh Al Kaabi said on Monday that the Gulf region will play an increasingly important role in protecting global energy supply chains in the coming decades as the world transitions to alternative forms of energy.
He said this during his participation in the Global Energy Forum, organised by Atlantic Council in partnership with the World Government Summit Organisation.
This year’s forum, taking place as at World Government Summit (WGS2022) in Dubai, focuses on meeting short term energy challenges and examining geopolitical, energy market, and climate changes to shape the energy system.
Al Kaabi affirmed that governments must develop initiatives to mitigate supply chain challenges to meet net-zero carbon targets during a keynote titled “investing in net-zero: The UAE Approach”.
Al Kaabi noted that global energy security will extend beyond oil as the UAE and its neighbours’ transition to become leaders in clean energy production, to generate highly competitive energy, referring to the UAE’s achievements in reducing the cost of solar energy in 2020, when tariffs for solar photovoltaic energy in the UAE dropped few cents amid significant investments in solar energy infrastructure.
The investments which were part of the UAE’s National Energy Plan 2050 aims to increase the contribution of clean energy in the total energy mix from 25 percent to 50 percent by 2050 and reduce the carbon footprint of power generation by 70 percent by 2050.
Mubadala’s UAE Investment chief also referred to the UAE’s investments in green and blue hydrogen as the country’s aim to reach diversity in energy sources and economy. “We have embraced renewable energy, as well as we have embraced natural gas.”