Riyadh’s $8 Billion Solar Surge Leaves Oil Strategy Untouched

Saudi Arabia seeks to raise its solar and wind power capacity with multi-billion-dollar deals. The Kingdom, the world’s top crude oil exporter, wants to develop all forms of energy, diversify its economy from oil, and replace oil in power generation with renewables and natural gas. The Saudis are not abandoning their primary role in global oil production and supply. But the more renewables they install, the more fuel for direct crude burn for power generation could be displaced, to free up more barrels of oil for exports. In one of the latest…