Saudi Arabia Produces Emissions Reports That are Out of Date and Not Reliable

RATING D

The National Inventory of Anthropogenic Emissions by Sources and Removals by Sinks of Greenhouse Gases can be accessed via the KAPSARC website (King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and Research Centre), which has been extracted from The First Biennial Update Report (BUR1) of the Kingdom of Saudia Arabia, Third National Communication of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and Fourth National Communication of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia submitted to The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. This is a public dataset, and the data can be found for 2010, 2012, and 2016.

According to the first Biennial Update Report to the UNFCCC, Saudi Arabia performs its own emissions inventory with the aid of a “TTE,” or Team of Technical Experts, from various countries and disciplines, who are listed in the report as follows: Ms. Patience Damptey (former member of the CGE from Ghana), Ms. Mausami Desai (member of the CGE from the United States of America), Mr. Stephen King’uyu (former member of the CGE from Kenya), Ms. Eva Krtkova (Czechia), Mr. Lawrence Mashungu (Zimbabwe), Mr. Koki Okawa (Japan), Mr. Sachidananda Satapathy (former member of the CGE from India) and Mr. Ching Tiong Tan (Malaysia). Ms. Desai and Mr. Tan were the co-leads. The technical analysis was coordinated by Mr. Tomoyuki Aizawa, Ms. Alma Jean, and Mr. Sohel Pasha (secretariat).

The last GHG Inventory Report issued by the Saudi Ministry of Energy was for the year 2016. The inventory included the direct greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions, namely, carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), and nitrous oxide (N2O). Emissions of these gases were calculated for the energy, industrial processes, product use, agriculture, forestry and other land-use, and waste sectors in the Kingdom. The total amount of GHG emissions in Saudi Arabia included

498,853 Gg excluding Land Use and Change Forestry (LUCF) and 489,702 Gg including LUCF of CO2 emissions, 1,779 Gg of CH4 emissions, and 38.90 Gg of N2O emissions, with the energy sector contributing 89.1% of the total CO2 emissions, followed by the industrial processes and product use sector (10.8%) and the agriculture sub-sector (0.13%). testing (0.91%).

The Kingdom’s GHG emissions have increased by 262% between 1990 and 2019 to reach 774 MtCO2e/yr, then slightly decreased in 2020 to 712.59 Mt of CO2e. Based on the data available, Saudi Arabia is the world’s 11th largest emitter, with a total share of 1.5%, and the country’s progress in reducing GHG emissions has been negligible. The Kingdom needs to adjust its policies to completely phase out fossil fuel consumption and production. GHG emissions from the energy sector represent 78.83% at 561.75 MtCO2e, while industrial processes contributed 16% or 114.02 MtCO2e of the total GHG emissions. Saudi Arabia also needs to expand investments in and speed up the implementation of renewable energy projects.

This Post was submitted by Climate Scorecard Saudi Arabia Country Managers Abeer Abdulkareem and Amgad Ellaboudy

A URL link to Saudi Arabia’s latest GHG Inventory Report

https://unfccc.int/documents?f%5B0%5D=country%3A1236

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