An oil giant pursues the sun

A worker removes sand from a solar array in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

prince to wean the economy off oil exports and create meaningful jobs for the hundreds of thousands of young people entering the workforce each year. The government has also been investing in other sectors, including entertainment and technology, and has announced plans to sell a 5 percent stake in Aramco to create the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund.

“Oil is not going to be with us forever, and we

need to produce other engines of growth,” said Amin Shibani, office director for the minister of energy, industry and mineral resources, Khalid Falih.

Moreover, Shibani said, the demand for electricity has surged by about 7 percent a year over the last decade, the product of a growing population, a construction boom and heavily subsidized prices that in effect encouraged people to indulge in comforts such as

air conditioning. The country’s growing cities and industries are also heavily reliant on desalination for their water supplies, an energy-draining process.

Almost all of that electricity is produced by burning oil and natural gas. But rapid declines in the cost of solar and wind generation have made renewable energy an increasingly attractive alternative, even for one of the world’s biggest producers of fossil fuels.