In prosperous Dubai, adorned with skyscrapers, regional crises have failed to mar its development. Can the COP28 summit benefit this city?

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - In a city known for its luxurious achievements, whether it's the world's tallest building or partying on the beaches of its resorts and bars, Dubai has once again set a record on the sand dunes of its deserted outskirts. The Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park, named after Dubai's ruling sheikh, spans 122 kilometers square (47 square miles) and represents this nation's billion-dollar investment to achieve its goal of being carbon neutral by 2050. It's a bet on solar panels in a city where casinos have yet to appear, though it always seems to bet big despite the risk.

There is a risk of reputational damage to the UAE if they don't make progress in negotiations, especially given that they are the largest oil producer, said Christian Coates Ulrichsen, a researcher at Rice University's Baker Institute who has long studied the region. - "There is also a risk that the media and civil society will focus on critical issues such as the UAE's plans to expand oil production capacity and portray the UAE as part of the problem rather than the climate policy solution," Ulrichsen added.

But given the futuristic urban outline of central Dubai - and the way it glitters at night when one side of the Burj Khalifa glows with a huge 770-meter (2,525-foot) high LED display - it's easy to forget that the city didn't get its first electricity generator until 1952. Before that, the nights along its named Dubai Creek, where the village first grew up, were lit only by candles and kerosene lamps.

Oil first discovered off the coast of Dubai in 1966 has never reached the same levels as in the sands and waters of Abu Dhabi, which became the capital of the United Arab Emirates when the country was formed in 1971. Dubai instead used oil as seed money for massive infrastructure projects that seemed to come at just the right time as the UAE became home to an estimated 9.3 million people - only 10 percent of them Emiratis and the rest foreign workers and their families.

The massive port of Jebel Ali, the US Navy's busiest port outside the US, is the world's largest man-made port. It was opened in 1979, just before the Iran-Iraq war. Many ships damaged in this conflict ended up in Jebel Ali for repairs, bringing money to the region.

This money also built the Dubai World Trade Center, which in 1979 stood out as the only skyscraper in the vast desert. But today it finds itself overshadowed by all the towers that followed, fueled by a boom in the city's real estate market that came after the 2002 decision to allow foreigners to buy property.

The decision came after the start of the US-led war in Afghanistan and before the US led invasion of Iraq. Dubai became a safe harbor for people with the means to flee conflicts, as well as those who needed to keep tens of millions of dollars in alleged illicitly acquired income. This has led to a lot of investment. This continues during Russia's war with Ukraine as Russian investors invest money in Dubai real estate projects.

At the same time, the UAE was fighting a war in Yemen in which its soldiers and allies were criticized for indiscriminate strikes and abuses on the battlefield. The UAE also has ties to leaders who in the West are viewed with great skepticism or, at worst, are subject to financial sanctions. This includes Libyan warlord Khalifa Hifter and the leader of Sudan's Rapid Reaction Force, Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, fighting in Sudan with forces that the U.S. Department calls "conflict-related sexual violence and conflict-related killings. "

The most likely target of the UAE's adoption of COP28 is oil washing reputation

Said Jodi Vittori, a versatile scholar at the Carnegie Foundation for International Peace who has written widely about Dubai as a haven for money laundering. - By adopting COP28, the UAE could shift media headlines from their support for the murderous RSF in Sudan and easier circumvention of Russian sanctions to their supposed good deeds.

In response to questions from The Associated Press about criticism of their foreign policy and other issues, the UAE government said that "the UAE is deeply concerned about human rights and will continue to develop in this area.

- "As a COP28 adopter, the UAE welcomes constructive dialog and will continue to work with international partners and stakeholders to achieve influential results," the statement said. - "Climate change is a global issue that requires a collective effort, and this significant and important event will be a conference event. "

Turn to green energy while increasing oil production

Generators have fueled Dubai's growth for decades, first with noisy diesel units and then with gas-fired power plants that still provide the bulk of Dubai's power supply for its skyscrapers and important dewatering stations to provide water. Gas comes from both Abu Dhabi and neighboring Qatar.

In recent years, however, Dubai has embraced renewable energy, although for a while it looked like it would launch a coal-fired power plant before switching to gas as the COP28 date approached.

The crown jewel of Dubai's clean energy efforts is the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park, 50 kilometers southeast of the city center. There, solar panels stretch to the horizon, absorbing the sun's rays in a country that sees an average of 10 hours of sunlight in 350 days a year.

Above it all, the world's tallest solar tower stands some 260 meters (850 feet) high in the distance. It gathers light from 70,000 reflectors to boil salt to run an electricity-generating turbine.

Dubai has spent billions of dollars to build this power plant, which involves companies from China, Saudi Arabia and other countries. By 2030, the city hopes to have 5 gigawatts of electricity from the plant, which could power about 1.3 million homes by U.S. standards. The state's current peak demand is nearly 10 gigawatts, as indicated by Dubai Electricity and Water Services, the sole provider of the utility.

In general, the UAE says it plans to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. While specific plans to achieve this goal are not specified, projects such as the Barakah solar park and nuclear power plant in Abu Dhabi, the first on the Arabian Peninsula, have the goal of making electricity generation a green endeavor.

But keeping an eye on these projects is not easy in the Emirates, where speech is still tightly controlled. Authorities did not respond to several requests from AP reporters to visit the solar power plant. Requests to visit the country's four-reactor nuclear power plant have been expected for several years.

While the UAE is pledging to get rid of its own emissions, it also plans to increase its oil production.

As a member of OPEC, the UAE produces about 4 million barrels of crude oil per day. It aims to produce 5 million barrels of oil a day in the coming years, a fuel that will be exported, used by other countries and contribute to climate change.

These plans have sparked criticism from activists ahead of COP28, much of it directed mainly at the head of the upcoming negotiations - oil chief Sultan al-Jaber.

"The UAE must stop the greenwashing campaign, abandon plans to dramatically increase state oil and gas production and address the deep conflict of interest created" by al-Jaber's appointment, more than 200 groups said in a long-running letter in September.

Al-Jaber, who has also spearheaded billions of dollars of Emirati investment in renewable energy, dismissed criticism from those who "just attack without knowing anything, without knowing who we are. "

The US supports al-Jaber's appointment, with the White House's top energy diplomat praising the Emirati strategy of bringing activists and the oil industry to COP28. "I think having COP28 here in this region, in an oil-producing country, is an opportunity for us to bring the oil industry and climate advocates together to say, 'How can we cooperate?"' - said U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein at a meeting in Bahrain last week.

The international hosting of COP28 with King Charles and Pope Francis and other world leaders represents an opportunity, as well as a risk, for Dubai due to broad regional tensions over Israel's war on Gaza.

The already concluded energy and water agreement between the UAE, Jordan and Israel, signed during the Expo, has collapsed due to the war.

Meanwhile, the UAE has promised to allow protests at the summit. The UAE government told AP that "participants can peacefully assemble and express their votes in special areas in both the Blue and Green zones of the venue. The green zone will be accessible to the general public under the UAE's control, while the blue zone will be the venue for formal negotiations, an area managed by the UN.".

- "We invite all participants to express their views in a positive and constructive manner, sharing solutions to address the climate crisis," the government said.