HIBBA AL KINDI
MUSCAT, DEC 6
The Green Hydrogen Summit continues on its second day at the Oman Convention and Exhibitions Centre in Muscat. The conference, under the patronage of the Ministry of Energy and Minerals, aims to address the various aspects of the hydrogen value chain.
In his keynote speech, Minister of Energy and Minerals, Eng Salim al Aufi, shared a recap of last year's summit.
"Since we met last year in this very same place, there was of course the very historic announcement of the 2050 net zero by His Majesty, which gave us a huge boost because that got the decarbonisation momentum going in a very big scale. It is not something that we talk about anymore , it is something that we have to deliver against," he said.
"We established four or five basic sectors that contribute to around 95% of our total CO2 emission , added Al Aufi.
Those sectors include industry, electricity, gas and oil, mobility and urban planning.
The Minister reaffirmed Oman’s commitment to the policy.
"For each of these sectors we have set up ambitious targets. We know that some of them would be challenging to achieve today, because if it was easy we would have done it a long time back. It is definitely not easy, but we are committing to follow through and achieve."
Chief Executive Officer of Energy Development Oman and Chairman of the Summit Eng Mazin al Lamki emphasised the importance of clean energy in his opening remarks.
"We are in a decisive crossroad of historic proportions, our resilience is being tested with energy price volatility and environmental pressures” he said.
“The reality is, producing more energy reliably and affordably at lower costs with less emission has become an unmistakable expectation from our leaders,” he added.
Al Lamki elaborated the role of Hydrogen Oman, a subsidiary of Energy Development Oman, in this process.
"Energy Development Oman plays the role of an overarching orchestrator and facilitator of Oman’s energy transition. HYDROM for instance is the first company of its kind in the Middle East which [operates] as an orchestrator and one of a kind of very few facilitators for green hydrogen globally. Which is a testament to Man's commitment to sustainability moving forward"
Al Lamki also emphasised the role of younger generation in this transition.
"All of these plans would not make any significant progress for Oman without creating high skilled and sustainable jobs for our youth with their intellectual development being a primary objective to achieving our sustainability goals."
The summit’s strategic sessions of the day focused on Oman's role in the Hydrogen Economy in terms of infrastructure, production and strategy. In addition to Oman's role in the hydrogen industry globally in an executive panel composed of the Minister of Energy of Minerals, Salim al Aufi, the Deputy Vice Minister for Climate and Energy at the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy, Netherlands, Dr M G Michel Heijdra, Deputy Director of Bilateral Energy Cooperation at the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK) Ellen von Zitzewitz, Managing Director of Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) Steve Phimister, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency (IEA) Dr Fatih Birol.
The summit also ran parallel technical workshops, in addition to an accompanying exhibition with over 30 local and global participants in the field of hydrogen.
Oman Observer is now on the WhatsApp channel. Click here
