The Gulf Goes Green

In the last few years, the global energy outlook has been transformed. The rise of populist politics and a growing sense of urgency about climate change have roiled debates about energy policy in wealthy countries, generating a dizzying mix of new industrial policies. The COVID-19 pandemic made it far harder to predict fuel prices and consumption patterns and forced many countries to confront their connections to fragile multistate supply chains and legacy petrostates. Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine shattered any remaining fantasies of self-reliance, pushing Europe to reconsider its dependence on Russian resources and forcing the United States to acknowledge the Gulf’s persisting leverage in energy markets.

Throughout this tumult, however, the role of Gulf states, rich with oil and gas, seemed to change little. Many analysts assumed these relatively inflexible autocracies would experience a slow decline as the growth in renewable energy rendered them dinosaurs dependent on declining hydrocarbon revenues and unable to diversify or reform their economies without risking popular unrest. But that position, too, is softening. Gulf states are now presenting themselves as drivers of a global clean energy transition. At home, they are modeling a new, statist framework for a shift toward cleaner energy, challenging 50 years of conventional wisdom that aggressive government intervention in an energy sector doesn’t work. Abroad, they are seeking new energy partnerships with environmentally conscious developed countries and investing in clean energy in emerging economies in the Middle East and beyond.

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