Towards sustainable energy trends in the Middle East: A study of four major emitters

Energy is a key ingredient to facilitate economic development in the Middle East. Expectations for a rapidly growing economy in the next decade will likely cause an increase in the fraction of energy consumed domestically limiting what is available for export. These challenges are the biggest for re...

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Main Authors: Bayomi, Norhan, Fernandez, John
Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Building Technology Group
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2020
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/124226
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author Bayomi, Norhan
Fernandez, John
author2 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Building Technology Group
author_facet Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Building Technology Group
Bayomi, Norhan
Fernandez, John
author_sort Bayomi, Norhan
collection MIT
description Energy is a key ingredient to facilitate economic development in the Middle East. Expectations for a rapidly growing economy in the next decade will likely cause an increase in the fraction of energy consumed domestically limiting what is available for export. These challenges are the biggest for resource-rich countries, since their economy is heavily dependent on fossil fuel exports alongside an energy-intensive economy. Thus, the paper addresses the question of how the development of energy systems among resource-rich countries has changed over the past three decades and what role can they play in the sustainable development of the region's energy system and emission reduction goals? To address this question, we present an overview on energy trends in four resource-rich countries in the Middle East, which nearly account for 76% of the region's energy-related emissions and about 77% of total energy consumption. These countries are namely, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the UAE. Accordingly, we present a comparative energy analysis between the four countries through examining historical and current energy trends, the structure of energy supply, the status of renewable deployment and energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Results from the analysis showed that inefficient energy production and consumption have played a role in the deterioration of the energy landscape of the four countries compared to the global energy system. Thus, this highlights the necessity for suitable energy strategies and effective policies that will be central to sustainable energy development. The analysis presented here could be used to better understanding of the impacts of current gaps and inefficiencies in large energy consumers in the Middle East. Keywords: energy; CO[subscript 2] emissions; Middle East; STEEP analysis; fossil fuels
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spelling mit-1721.1/1242262022-09-26T10:02:48Z Towards sustainable energy trends in the Middle East: A study of four major emitters Bayomi, Norhan Fernandez, John Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Building Technology Group Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Architecture Energy is a key ingredient to facilitate economic development in the Middle East. Expectations for a rapidly growing economy in the next decade will likely cause an increase in the fraction of energy consumed domestically limiting what is available for export. These challenges are the biggest for resource-rich countries, since their economy is heavily dependent on fossil fuel exports alongside an energy-intensive economy. Thus, the paper addresses the question of how the development of energy systems among resource-rich countries has changed over the past three decades and what role can they play in the sustainable development of the region's energy system and emission reduction goals? To address this question, we present an overview on energy trends in four resource-rich countries in the Middle East, which nearly account for 76% of the region's energy-related emissions and about 77% of total energy consumption. These countries are namely, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the UAE. Accordingly, we present a comparative energy analysis between the four countries through examining historical and current energy trends, the structure of energy supply, the status of renewable deployment and energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Results from the analysis showed that inefficient energy production and consumption have played a role in the deterioration of the energy landscape of the four countries compared to the global energy system. Thus, this highlights the necessity for suitable energy strategies and effective policies that will be central to sustainable energy development. The analysis presented here could be used to better understanding of the impacts of current gaps and inefficiencies in large energy consumers in the Middle East. Keywords: energy; CO[subscript 2] emissions; Middle East; STEEP analysis; fossil fuels 2020-03-24T14:49:58Z 2020-03-24T14:49:58Z 2019-04-28 2019-02-21 2019-08-05T15:42:23Z Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle 1996-1073 https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/124226 Bayomi, Northan and John E. Fernandez. "Towards sustainable energy trends in the Middle East: A study of four major emitters." Energies 12, 9 (April 2019): 1615. © 2019 by the authors en 10.3390/en12091615 Energies Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ application/pdf MDPI AG MDPI
spellingShingle Bayomi, Norhan
Fernandez, John
Towards sustainable energy trends in the Middle East: A study of four major emitters
title Towards sustainable energy trends in the Middle East: A study of four major emitters
title_full Towards sustainable energy trends in the Middle East: A study of four major emitters
title_fullStr Towards sustainable energy trends in the Middle East: A study of four major emitters
title_full_unstemmed Towards sustainable energy trends in the Middle East: A study of four major emitters
title_short Towards sustainable energy trends in the Middle East: A study of four major emitters
title_sort towards sustainable energy trends in the middle east a study of four major emitters
url https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/124226
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