{"id":3793,"date":"2025-08-25T19:33:40","date_gmt":"2025-08-25T19:33:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gulfif.org\/app\/gss-workshops\/?post_type=workshop&p=3793"},"modified":"2026-02-09T16:43:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T16:43:11","slug":"gulf-energy-giants-the-geopolitics-of-energy-systems-and-the-emergent-role-of-the-gulf-states","status":"publish","type":"workshop","link":"https:\/\/gulfif.org\/app\/gss-workshops\/workshop\/gulf-energy-giants-the-geopolitics-of-energy-systems-and-the-emergent-role-of-the-gulf-states\/","title":{"rendered":"Gulf Energy Giants: The Geopolitics of Energy Systems and the Emergent Role of the Gulf States"},"content":{"rendered":"

This workshop is cosponsored with the Middle East Institute.<\/em><\/p>\n

This workshop will examine how Gulf energy giants are transforming from traditional oil exporters into full-spectrum energy enterprises that integrate fossil fuels, renewables, and transition fuels. The discussion will highlight how Gulf states leverage sovereign wealth funds, national oil companies, and strategic partnerships to shape the pace and direction of global energy transitions. By analyzing both domestic initiatives and overseas investments, the workshop aims to uncover the Gulf\u2019s growing influence in emerging economies and its impact on global energy security.<\/p>\n

Gulf state-led renewable energy projects, whether domestic or international, are not a replacement for oil export revenue. Instead, they expand Gulf states\u2019 energy portfolios into a diversified enterprise that encompasses fossil fuels, renewables, and transition technologies. The ability to manage and intervene across energy systems is becoming a central source of political and economic power, particularly through sovereign investment vehicles.<\/p>\n

This workshop will also explore the extent of Gulf capacity across fuel types and geographies, and assess implications for global competitors, including U.S. fossil fuel producers, as well as for energy security in BRICS nations and developing economies. Key questions include the Gulf\u2019s role in financing renewable deployment, its partnerships with China in energy manufacturing, and the geopolitical consequences of Gulf-controlled energy infrastructure across the Middle East, Africa, and Asia.<\/p>\n

Gulf state-led renewable energy projects, whether domestic or as outside project development and investments, are not a replacement for oil export revenue. They are additive to using energy production and expertise as a global and diversified, full spectrum (fossil fuels and renewables) energy enterprise. The ability to manage and intervene across the energy system will become an increasing source of political and economic power for states and their sovereign investment vehicles. This emergent reality shapes the possibilities of an energy transition and energy affordability and accessibility for much of the Global South. The workshop aims to uncover the extent of Gulf energy giants’ capacity across fuel types and geographies, and to investigate the possible impacts to other energy competitors (including US fossil fuel production) and a reshaping of energy security for BRICS nations and developing economies.<\/p>\n

The capacity to develop renewable power projects rests on access to capital, technology and component supply chains, as well as the political initiative to secure off-take agreements with state-owned or controlled utilities across emerging market developing economies. Here the GCC states, and especially state-owned or state-related entities in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, are at an advantage.<\/p>\n

The Gulf states are not only attracting investment in clean energy but also seek to become development players themselves, using their sovereign funds and state-owned energy firms to invest aggressively in renewable energy and carbon-intense projects in the region and beyond. The funding gap between need and investment in clean energy in the developing world is massive. The Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change 2021 report estimated that around $3 trillion in annual investments will be needed to transition to a low-carbon global economy, three quarters of which must be directed outside of the world\u2019s seven largest developed economies.<\/p>\n

Gulf states are positioning themselves to help fill that gap. Gulf states typically invest in high-growth, high-population areas that will likely need more energy from the Gulf in the future\u2014not only oil and gas but also electricity. At a cost of $1.8 billion, Saudi Arabia is now building a high-voltage direct current interconnector that will eventually send 3,000 megawatts of electricity to Egypt. A similar interconnector will begin supplying Iraq with GCC states\u2019 electricity next year. ACWA Power, in which the Saudi Public Investment Fund is a 50 percent stakeholder, is developing solar power plants in Azerbaijan, Ethiopia, Iraq, and Uzbekistan. In 2022, Masdar, an energy company fully owned by the UAE, announced it is spearheading renewable energy projects in Angola, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Romania, Tanzania, Uganda, and Angola. The data visualization tool specifically highlights the projects deployed by ACWA Power, a renewable energy company that is partially owned by the Public Investment Fund (the Saudi sovereign wealth fund) and its co-investors from the Silk Road Fund (a Chinese sovereign fund) and projects developed and financed by Masdar, a wholly-owned company of\u00a0 three UAE government shareholders: Mubadala (an Abu Dhabi sovereign fund), the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, (ADNOC) and Abu Dhabi National Energy Company (TAQA).<\/p>\n

Partnerships in renewable supply chain manufacturing and co-investment also facilitate this expansion into renewable power deployment. The traditional Arab oil giants of the Gulf are also pursuing new shared investments with China in solar manufacturing and power plant development. The Chinese companies TZE, Sungrow, and JinkoSolar, for example, are all expanding export and their manufacturing capacity in the Middle East, most notably in Oman, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. At home manufacturing capacity allows for the future export of solar panels and components that will supply the projects won by state-owned and related entities like ACWA Power in Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n

The Gulf states and their renewable energy firms and investment vehicles have the capacity and the interest to shape the direction and pace of the energy transition across the wider Middle East and a growing geography of emerging market developing economies, each reliant on investment and financial intervention from the Gulf states, along with more traditional forms of infrastructure investment and aid. Owning, operating and controlling a country\u2019s power production is a mighty\u2014and durable\u2014political tool, as typical power projects are financed for as long as 30 years. Transitioning to renewable energy can lower the price of reliable electricity, allowing people and commerce to thrive as long as investors ensure that the projects they back meet standards of transparency and accountability.<\/p>\n

The workshop will consider papers and investigations into both fossil fuel production and influence in global markets, as well as in transition fuels (low carbon LNG, low carbon and green hydrogen, solar and wind power, and nuclear power.)<\/p>\n

Papers are not limited to, but would be encouraged to address the following themes:<\/strong><\/p>\n