Gulf Opec members have pledged a total of 750 million dollars to a new fund to tackle global warming through financing research for a clean environment, the Saudi foreign minister said on November 18.
Prince Saud al-Faisal told a press conference at the end of a two-day summit for Opec leaders that Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar pledged 150 million dollars each for the fund.
Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporter, said it would invest 300 million dollars in the fund which is set to focus on finding technological solutions to the climate change problem.
According to the final summit statement, Opec leaders will insist on the importance of technology to enable the use of "clean oil," notably carbon capture and storage, to help fight global warming.
The leaders "stress the importance of cleaner and more efficient petroleum technologies for the protection of the local, regional and global environment, and the importance of expediting the development of technologies that address climate change, such as carbon capture and storage," said the statement.
They also reaffirmed "the core principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in addressing climate change policies and measures, including the implementation of UN Frame Work Convention on Climate Change and Kyoto protocol," it said.
Oil producers have been under fire because of carbon emissions from the large-scale use of fossil fuels. Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz described attempts to exaggerate the impact of oil on the environment and climate change as "erroneous."
Prince Saud said "it was important that oil should not be blamed for environmental and climatic changes."
"We are part of this world and any harmful effects of climate changes will also affect us," he said.
Opec ministers expressed support for carbon capture and storage, an emerging technology to trap carbon dioxide and store it underground.
"Protecting the planet" was one of three headline themes of the Opec summit, a surprising focus for a group of oil producers whose wealth depends on their exports of fossil fuels.
A UN report released on November 17 said evidence of a human role in the warming of the planet was now "unequivocal" and the effects on the climate system could be "abrupt or irreversible."
Carbon capture technology, with which non-Opec oil producer Norway is leading the way, consists of trapping carbon dioxide and storing it long-term underground. It is still in the development stage and some experts have doubted it will work.
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