Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- On 17–18 August, the state visit of the President of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia took place. This event, without any exaggeration, can be called historical, since this is the first state visit of the President of Uzbekistan to the KSA in 30 years.

The agenda of the visit was intense, the parties discussed a number of issues in the trade, economic, investment, energy, cultural and humanitarian spheres. As a result of the talks, a solid package of documents was adopted, designed to bring Uzbek-Saudi relations to a qualitatively new level.

In particular, Uzbekistan and Saudi Arabia signed agreements worth US$12 billion, envisaging the modernization of the fuel and energy complex, investment in alternative energy, as well as training and advanced training of Uzbek specialists.

The Saudi company ACWA Power, a leading developer, investor and operator of power plants, as well as desalination and green hydrogen plants, will build the world’s largest wind farm with a capacity of 1.5 GW in Karakalpakstan. It will provide electricity to 1.65 million households and offset 2.4 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions per year.

In addition, ACWA Power and Air Products will develop research and development with subsequent production of green hydrogen in Uzbekistan.

At the same time, a document was signed on the intention of Saudi Arabia to invest US$10 billion in the energy sector of Uzbekistan in the next 5 years to continue the implementation of projects in the field of renewable energy, as well as generation using natural gas as fuel.

It should be noted that KSA pays special attention to the development of alternative energy in the country. Riyadh has set an ambitious goal to bring the share of renewable energy in the country’s energy balance to 50% by 2030. In Saudi Arabia, the introduction of solar energy is accelerating - if in 2000 solar panels generated 0.35 MW of electricity, then in 2019 - 394 MW.

In turn, Uzbekistan has recently been taking measures to switch to the "green" rails of development. An important direction in this regard is to increase the share of renewable energy sources in the country’s energy balance.

Our country has a huge potential for renewable energy, the technical potential of which is 180 million tons of oil equivalent. This is more than 3 times the annual need of Uzbekistan for energy resources.

At the same time, at present, the share of renewable sources in Uzbekistan is 10%, by 2030 it is planned to increase this figure to 25%. The construction of almost 10 GW of new alternative energy facilities is envisaged, including 5 GW of solar, 3 GW of wind and 1.9 GW of hydroelectric power plants.

It is noteworthy that Tashkent and Riyadh are already actively cooperating in the energy sector. ACWA Power is implementing a number of projects in our country, incl. construction of two wind power plants with a capacity of 500 MW each in the Bukhara region and 100 MW in Karakalpakstan, and a thermal power plant with a capacity of 1500 MW in the Syrdarya region.

In general, the agreements reached following the state visit of the President of Uzbekistan to Saudi Arabia will be a cardinal step towards a new stage in Uzbek-Saudi energy cooperation.

They will undoubtedly contribute to the further development of "green" energy in our country, strengthening the scientific and technical potential in this direction, and will also contribute to the sustainable development of Uzbekistan.

Marat Aitov,

Head of the Department of the Institute for Strategic and Interregional Studies under the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan