Publications

Energy Price Reform in Saudi Arabia: Modeling the Economic and Environmental Impacts and Understanding the Demand Response

Science Direct

Saudi Arabia has regulated domestic energy prices for decades, setting them below international market levels. Energy subsidies in Saudi Arabia are generally implicit because they lead to foregone revenues for the government. Low energy prices also encourage rapid energy demand…

Mohammad Aldubyan, Anwar Gasim

What Happened to Residential Electricity Consumption in Saudi Arabia Between 2015 and 2018?

Mohammad Aldubyan, Anwar Gasim

Between 2007 and 2018, residential electricity consumption in Saudi Arabia increased by 45%, from around 89 terawatthours (TWh) to 130 TWh (SAMA 2019). Population and gross domestic product (GDP) are two key factors that influence residential electricity consumption.

Aldubyan, Mohammad

Gasim, Anwar

Energy Price Reform in Saudi Arabia: Modeling the Economic and Environmental Impact and Understanding the Demand Response

Mohammad Aldubyan, Anwar Gasim

The government of Saudi Arabia, like many around the world, has long set domestic energy prices far below international market levels. This helps keep prices stable and energy affordable, providing important support to lower-income households.    

Aldubyan, Mohammad

Gasim, Anwar

Why Did Domestic Gasoline Prices Fall in Saudi Arabia?

Anwar Gasim, Mohammad Aldubyan

What is behind the dramatic fall in gasoline prices? On May 11, 2020, Saudi Arabia slashed its domestic gasoline prices. The price of 91-octane gasoline fell from 1.31 to 0.67 Saudi Arabian riyals (SAR) per liter, while the price of…

Gasim, Anwar

Aldubyan, Mohammad

Industrial Energy Consumption in Saudi Arabia

Anwar Gasim

In 2017, Saudi Arabia’s total final energy consumption was 140.7 million tonnes of oil equivalent (Mtoe). Total final energy consumption is defined as energy used by final consumers (or end users). It includes electricity use in residential buildings, gasoline use…

Gasim, Anwar

Modelling industrial energy demand in Saudi Arabia

Portsmouth

Between 1986 and 2016, industrial energy consumption in Saudi Arabia increased by tenfold, making it one of the largest end-use sectors in the Kingdom. Despite its importance, there appear to be no published econometric studies on aggregate industrial energy demand…

Anwar Gasim, Shahad Alarenan, Lester C. Hunt

Modeling Industrial Energy Demand in Saudi Arabia and Understanding Its Drivers

Shahad Alarenan, Anwar Gasim, Lester C. Hunt

In 2016 Saudi Arabia’s industrial (or manufacturing) sector accounted for 30.3% of total final energy consumption (IEA 2018a). When non-energy use (mainly feedstock for the petrochemical subsector) is included, the industrial sector᾽s share of total final energy consumption rises to…

Alarenan, Shahad

Gasim, Anwar

Hunt, Lester C.

Gasoline Price Reform in Saudi Arabia

Anwar Gasim, Mohammad Aldubyan

Saudi Arabia has been adjusting gasoline prices on a quarterly basis since the start of 2019, with the most recent adjustment occurring on July 14, 2019. These adjustments depend on changes in international oil prices, and are smaller than the…

Gasim, Anwar

Aldubyan, Mohammad

An Empirical Analysis of the Welfare Implications of the Direct Rebound Effect

Springer

Improving the energy efficiency of an energy service, such as lighting, cooling, or driving, makes the service cheaper, normally leading consumers to demand more of it. This additional demand is known as the direct rebound effect.

Ziyad Alfawzan, Anwar Gasim

Gasoline demand, pricing policy, and social welfare in Saudi Arabia: A quantitative analysis

Energy Policy

Domestic energy prices in Saudi Arabia are set below international market prices. This, coupled with rapid economic and population growth, is believed to have contributed to the rapid growth in domestic energy demand and, recently, affected the government budget in…

Tarek Atalla, Anwar Gasim, Lester C. Hunt

Welfare Implications of the Rebound Effect From More Energy-Efficient Passenger Cars

Anwar Gasim, Ziyad Alfawzan

Improving the energy efficiency of passenger cars makes it cheaper to drive, allowing motorists to take to the roads more frequently. This additional driving, which offsets some of the expected energy savings from energy efficiency, is known as the rebound…

Gasim, Anwar

Alfawzan, Ziyad

Gasoline Demand, Pricing Policy and Social Welfare in Saudi Arabia

Anwar Gasim

In the face of low international oil prices, countries in the Gulf Cooperation Council recently implemented fuel price reform across a number of sectors. Saudi Arabia, for example, announced in December 2015 an increase in the gasoline price. We undertook…

Gasim, Anwar

Policymakers Guide to the Various Ways of Calculating Energy Productivity

Anwar Gasim

The existence of multiple approaches to calculating energy productivity, with its resulting diverse outcomes, makes it difficult to draw meaningful comparisons between economies and monitor their progress over time. To understand better the implications of this, we conducted a systematic…

Gasim, Anwar

The embodied energy in trade: What role does specialization play?

Energy Policy

Many industrialized countries are net importers of embodied energy and emissions, while many developing countries are net exporters. We examine the role of specialization in driving these trade patterns by conducting a spatial index decomposition analysis on the embodied energy…

Anwar Gasim

Embodied energy in trade: What role does specialization play

Anwar Gasim

In global discussions aimed at limiting greenhouse gas emissions, the national targets set by governments are tied to the energy used or emissions generated within national borders. However, international trade can confuse the accounting. Moving a factory across the border…

Gasim, Anwar