Jul 23 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Jon Chavez The Blade, Toledo, Ohio



The United Arab Emirates is a world leader in oil exports, but if Sultan Al Jaber has his way, the Middle East nation one day will become the global leader in alternative energy.

"The United Arab Emirates has the third-largest oil reserves in the world. But that does not mean oil and gas will be there forever," said Mr. Al Jaber, an internationally recognized alternative energy expert.

A chemical engineer and businessman, Mr. Al Jaber leads his country's Masdar initiative -- a $22 billion effort to build a 45,000-people city that runs on alternative energy and has no carbon emissions, plus develop a world-class university for energy research. The eight-year project began in 2006.

 Mr. Al Jaber, chief executive officer of Abu Dhabi Future Energy Co., the entity created to develop the multifaceted Masdar initiative, spoke Thursday about the project and alternative energy during a discussion at the University of Toledo.

Although its economy is based on oil, Mr. Al Jaber said his country's leaders know their future lies in alternative energy. "Our interest here is very genuine. It's a logical extension, the next step," he said.

The United Arab Emirates has declared that by 2020, 7 percent of its power needs must come from renewable energy sources such as solar and wind. "The framework is in place to achieve that goal," said Mr. Al Jaber, who added researchers there are working with molten salt as a way to store excess alternative energy.

The experience the country gains with Masdar City is the next step to developing practical technologies for cities worldwide that can run on alternative energy. "We will make it com-mercially viable and offer it to the world," Mr. Al Jaber said.

Although Masdar is on budget, it's a few months behind schedule. Mr. Al Jaber said that is because the Masdar concept never has been tried before. "All the experts, the architects and contractors, none of them knew how to make [Masdar City]. ... It's never been done in the history of the world," he said of the plans to use solar and other clean energy, produce no carbon fuel emissions, and achieve a zero-waste ecology.

Developing his university, the Masdar Institute of Science and Technology, is challenging, he added. His country, like others, is experiencing "brain drain." The Masdar project calls for attracting world-class academics, keeping them with incentives, and creating business incubators with all levels of financial help to turn what gets developed there into new companies.

Helping to present Mr. Al Jaber an honorary doctorate yesterday was Dan Johnson, UT president emeritus and provost and COO at Zayed University in Dubai. He met Mr. Al Jaber two years ago and told him it would be valuable to build a relationship between the Masdar Institute and UT. Toledo officials were invited to a global summit on alternative energy in Abu Dhabi in 2009.

"We'll have to see how it develops, but clearly there is potential here," Mr. Johnson said. "This could be the beginning of something very important that connects Toledo with the Middle East in an area of common interest -- and that's alternative energy."

Contact Jon Chavez at:

jchavez@theblade.com

or 419-724-6128.

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