Very very little by way of information here. I suppose that given it's a memorandum of understanding (MOU) they're basically saying, "we'd like this to happen p

Very very little by way of information here. I suppose that given it's a memorandum of understanding (MOU) they're basically saying, "we'd like this to happen please". I think the scale of the project implies that this is going to be the power source for Neom† ( http://www.discoverneom.com/ http://www.discoverneom.com/ ), the new sci-fi city the Suadis are planning to build in the north-west of their country bordering Jordan and with Egypt across the water. See here‡ for an in-depth critique of that project. (Side note: is it just me or has Bloomberg's journalism gotten insanely impressive of late?) From the official blurb, “As the sun rises over NEOM, it will glint against vast fields of solar panels paired with wind turbines and light up enormous stretches of energy grids storing power for generations.” I guess we could call this MOU, “Neom-Solar”, part of the energy solution for powering Neom and beyond. One has to remember that the Saudi's sovereign wealth fund has something like $2T, that's T for trillion, so a joint $200B joint punt is well within their reach. And especially if they intend to diversify away from fossil fuels for power-gen and desalination. I guess we should applaud them because if the effects of climate change are potentially as bad as scientists claim they are the world needs a number of mega-projects like this to push the carbon needle firmly in the other direction. Note as well that since that Bloomberg article was written in October 2017 a number of the restrictions mentioned in the article as compared to Dubai have been lifted–notably women can drive from the summer onwards and do not have to wear an abaya in public so long as their dress is "decent and respectful"§. Perhaps more reforms are coming down the pipe? It's often been rumoured that the Saudi royalty and other wealthy individuals lead much more liberal lifestyles abroad (and even at home some say) than the laws of their own country would lead one to believe. I believe it is true that historically the Saudi royalty built their strength by allying themselves with the fundamentalist Wahabi clerical sect. Perhaps the Kingdom realises that they may have to partly sabotage that relationship in order to make their country more attractive to outside investment and in order to compete with their more liberal next door neighbours. And perhaps it is the subjects themselves in the kingdom who are agitating for some reforms. Anyway, it'd be nice in the future not to have to listen to jibes about how draconian the kingdom is on the religious front whenever some article about their progress in other areas is published. † discussion five months ago here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15543404 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15543404 ‡ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2017-neom-saudi-mega-city/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2017-neom-saudi-mega-city... § http://m.gulfnews.com/news/gulf/saudi-arabia/abaya-what-women-in-saudi-arabia-think-1.2196000 http://m.gulfnews.com/news/gulf/saudi-arabia/abaya-what-wome...