DAVOS — Women in Saudi Arabia are happy to be working on pink hydrogen, the Kingdom’s energy minister joked last week.

Prince Abdulaziz Bin Salman’s comments were delivered during the World Economic Forum, where he outlined the country’s ambition to be a world leader in hydrogen production.

A spectrum of colors describe the way the gas is extracted — with some much cleaner than others. ‘Pink’ hydrogen uses nuclear power to electrolyze water, thereby splitting hydrogen from oxygen for use as a fuel.

The minister said that women are particularly pleased to see progress being made in this industry.

“We are recruiting, by the way, young Saudi ladies that are happy to see the pink coming along,” Prince Abdulaziz said. “We have started being very conscious of taking care of our female new recruits and new cadets. We’re becoming an extremely well emancipated society.”

Saudi Arabia is the biggest exporter of crude oil in the world, but the Gulf nation is increasingly looking to hydrogen as the fuel of the future.

According to the International Renewable Energy Agency’s calculations, the global trade in hydrogen is expected to overtake oil by 2050.

Energy analysts are torn over hydrogen’s potential to decarbonize the global economy as it depends on the method used to make it and other factors.

Prince Abdulaziz acknowledged the EU is interested in green hydrogen — made by using renewable energy to split water molecules.

He said he had discussed exporting the low-carbon fuel to the EU with the European Commission’s Vice-President Frans Timmermans.

This would be partly supplied by a new $5 billion (€4.4 billion) green hydrogen plant in the new Saudi megacity of NEOM, due to start running by 2025.

However it is with blue hydrogen that the energy minister feels the nation can really excel. This is hydrogen extracted from fossil fuel gas like methane, with the potential to capture and store greenhouse gas emissions underground.

“We will have a field day with blue hydrogen because we’re the cheapest cost producer of gas,” said Prince Abdulaziz.

“We’re doing a huge investment in shale gas in Saudi Arabia and we will be dedicated to having that gas to be used for producing blue hydrogen.”

It is unlikely that hydrogen derived from fracked shale gas will be accepted under the EU’s forthcoming guidelines on hydrogen exports, Climate Home News reports.

As for pink hydrogen, Saudi Arabia is building up its nuclear power with two large reactors planned and smaller ones to de-salt sea water.

It is not such a natural choice of ‘color’ for the country to pursue, given its ideal location for using solar power to produce green hydrogen.

Last year, Saudi Arabia announced that it would generate 50 percent of its energy from renewables by 2030, having suffered from the effects of desertification, dust storms and air pollution that its oil-heavy economy is fueling. —Euronews