At the opening of the 2025 Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week and the Zayed Sustainability Prize Awards Ceremony, Dr. Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, UAE Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology and Masdar Chairman discussed the achievements of the United Arab Emirates in the renewable energy space. He also elaborated the likely impact of artificial intelligence on the future power demand and the way forward for the overall energy sector.
As we enter the second quarter of the 21st century, we find ourselves at a pivotal moment.
We are standing at the edge of two worlds, the world as we know it and at the world as it could be. This is a moment that I like to call the nexus of next. And please allow me to explain.
The fundamental transformation of our energy system that is expanding our energy mix and creating entirely new industries.
Three powerful forces are converging to reshape our future in ways we never thought possible. First, the growth of emerging markets, which is now driving more than half of the world’s prosperity.
Second, the fundamental transformation of our energy system that is expanding our energy mix and creating entirely new industries.
And third, the exponential growth of artificial intelligence that is changing the pace of change.
These trends together have the potential not just to drive progress, but in fact, to put progress into overdrive. In many ways, the United Arab Emirates embodies the nexus of next.
Our nation has always been uniquely positioned at the intersection of tradition and transformation. And our founding father, Sheikh Zayed, made the impossible not just possible, but inevitable. He turned arid sand into fertile land. And he laid the foundations that turned the UAE into the progressive energy leader it is today. The legacy of leadership continues to this day.
Under your guidance, we have set records in solar from the biggest single-site power plant to a world-leading desalination plant. We have set the pace in wind, creating wind farms that can operate in rough seas and at low speeds. We have set the bar in nuclear, with all four units of the Baraka plant fully operational.
We have set benchmarks in artificial intelligence from the Mohammed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence, the first ever home-grown, graduate-level, research-driven university entirely dedicated to AI, to strategic investment vehicles like MGX.
And it was your call for unity that nurtured multilateralism, allowed determination to conquer doubt, and brought the world together to deliver the historic UAE consensus at COP28.
For decades, the biggest barrier facing renewable energy has been intermittency. It has been the moonshot challenge of our time.
How can we power a world that never sleeps with energy sources that do? How can we transform renewable sources into reliable power?
And today, under your guidance, your Highness, we have an answer. I am pleased to announce the launch of the world’s first renewable energy facility capable of providing renewable energy at scale around the clock. In partnership with the Emirates Water and Electricity Company, Masdar is combining 5 GW of solar capacity with 19 GWh of storage to produce 1 GW of uninterrupted clean power.
This will for the first time ever transform renewable energy into baseload energy. It is a first step that could become a giant leap. And it simply would not have happened without the resolute support, drive, and determination of our leadership and our partners.
Battery storage is the fastest growing energy technology in the world today. A record 100 GW of storage will be added to the grid this year.
Battery storage is the fastest growing energy technology in the world today. A record 100 GW of storage will be added to the grid this year. Yet, this represents a tiny fraction of the overall power demand that is being driven by the megatrends and especially the surge in AI.
Before AI took off, power demand was already on track to grow from 9,000 GW to over 15,000 GW by 2035. But with apps like ChatGPT growing by half a billion visits every month and using 10 times as much energy as a single Google search, demand by 2050 could reach as high as 35,000 GW. We are talking about an increase of over 250 per cent.
And I am sure you would all agree that no single source of energy can meet this unprecedented demand. In a world where a billion people still lack access to energy, we need to have a diversity of energy options. And please allow me to be clear.
Policies and regulations that prematurely reduce those options are just self-defeating. Simply put, we need an end-to-end approach. And that is the thinking behind Abu Dhabi’s newest addition to its diversified energy portfolio, XRG.
XRG is an international energy investment company with a very unique architecture that can adapt to tomorrow’s energy needs. XRG literally means maximizing the potential of every unit, every spark, and every joule of energy. Investing across the full spectrum from gas to chemicals to low carbon fuels to energy infrastructure, XRG is an energy company designed for the future.
The nexus of next means putting people at the heart of progress. It means uniting to address global challenges. And it means recognizing that no discovery is worth making unless it helps humanity and improves lives.
And that is the Zayed Sustainability Prize. And that is what the prize is all about. Thanks to the prize, every day somewhere in the world, a village drinks clean water for the first time.
A child is able to study under solar-powered light. A farmer harvests crops from land that was once barren.
In closing, let me address a point that has dominated our energy and sustainability conversations for far too long. For too long, we have been trapped in a false choice between energy access and sustainability.
This either-or thinking is in fact paralyzing progress. And it is time to change the narrative. The truth is, energy and sustainability are not opposing factors.
They are essential partners. The choice is not between two paths. It’s about creating one new path together.
A path that unlocks growth, drives prosperity, and unleashes unprecedented economic opportunity. A path that delivers the nexus of next.
This is a lightly edited version of his address and the original speech can be accessed here
