Former Visiting Scholar, AGSIW
Aisha Al-Sarihi is a research scholar at Georgetown University. Before joining Georgetown, she served as a visiting scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington looking at the potential for climate policy integration into Saudi Arabia’s economic diversification strategies. She also served as a research officer at the London School of Economics and Political Science’s Middle East Centre, where her research was focused on climate policy in Oman and the United Arab Emirates. Her research interests include energy policy, renewables, and climate policies with a focus on the Gulf Arab states.
Al-Sarihi holds an MSc and a BSc, with distinction, in environmental science from Sultan Qaboos University and a PhD from the Centre for Environmental Policy at Imperial College London. Her thesis was focused on studying the challenges and opportunities for adopting renewable energy in Oman.
While Saudi Arabia’s long involvement in global climate change negotiations has attracted mounting attention, little is known about the kingdom’s climate change governance at the domestic level or its progress in terms of addressing climate change in line with economic diversification.
The Gulf states are in many ways among the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. Carbon pricing could be a useful tool to meet emissions reduction goals and hence reduce the adverse climate impacts on the region, while at the same time presenting opportunities for economic diversification.
To meet the dual challenge of energy security and climate change, the Gulf Arab states need a holistic understanding of energy systems when planning an advantageous energy mix.
Burning coal produces almost double the amount of carbon dioxide than other fossil fuels such as diesel or natural gas.
Since the 1930s, the Arab Gulf states have been defined by their hydrocarbon wealth.
Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil producer, is expected to double its greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 compared to 2014 levels.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Fifth Assessment Report indicates that each of the last three decades has been successively warmer at the Earth’s surface than any preceding decade since 1850.
