Bids open for first utility-scale wind farm in Saudi Arabia
$500m Dumat Al Jandal wind project forms part of Saudi goal to have 10% renewable energy by 2023.
Saudi Arabia
This archive collects solutions-journalism stories and milestones from Saudi Arabia — covering areas such as renewable energy, public health, urban development, and social policy. Each entry focuses on documented progress and constructive change happening in or connected to the country.
Saudi Arabia issues driving licences to women for first time in decades
Saudi Arabia has issued driving licences to women for the first time in decades just weeks before a ban on female drivers is lifted.
Saudi government says it will allow women to drive
Women in Saudi Arabia will be permitted to drive in the kingdom, according to a royal decree issued in Riyadh on Tuesday that overturned one of the most widely criticized restrictions on human rights.
Saudis kick off $50 billion renewable energy plan to cut oil use
Bidders seeking to qualify to build 700 megawatts of wind and solar power plants should submit documents by March 20, and those selected will be announced by April 10, Saudi Arabia’s energy ministry said Monday in an e-mailed statement.
Seven Arab states found the League of Arab States in Cairo
The League of Arab States was founded in Cairo on 22 March 1945, when seven nations signed a charter pledging cooperation while preserving each country’s full sovereignty. Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and North Yemen built a flexible framework of consultation over command. It became one of the world’s earliest regional intergovernmental bodies, now grown to 22 members.
Ibn Saud proclaims the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia after 30 years of unification
Saudi Arabia was formally proclaimed on September 23, 1932, when Ibn Saud renamed his unified territories after three decades of campaigning across the Arabian Peninsula. The journey began in 1902 with a night raid on Riyadh’s Masmak fortress, carried out by roughly 40 men returning from exile in Kuwait. It marked the consolidation of a long-fragmented region into a single modern state.
Muhammad bin Saud and Ibn Abd al-Wahhab found the Emirate of Diriyah
In 1744, in the Najdi town of Diriyah, a ruler and a religious reformer shook hands on a pact that would eventually give rise to Saudi Arabia. Muhammad bin Saud offered shelter and political backing; Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab offered religious legitimacy. From that modest desert compact grew one of the Arab world’s most enduring state-building experiments.
Muhammad’s Hijrah journey from Mecca to Medina founds the Islamic calendar
The Hijrah migration began in the summer of 622 C.E., when Muhammad and Abu Bakr slipped out of Mecca by night, hid three days in a cave, then rode 260 miles north to Medina. There, a compact among Muslim, Jewish, and Arab tribes took shape — a founding moment still anchoring the calendar of roughly 1.9 billion Muslims today.
Muhammad is born in Mecca, setting the founding of Islam in motion
Muhammad ibn Abdullah was born around 570 C.E. in Mecca, orphaned young and raised by his uncle in a bustling trade city at the crossroads of Arabia. Around age 40, he began reciting what became the Quran, and the community he founded grew into a tradition now followed by roughly 1.9 billion people.
Assyrian records place the Thamud among Arabia’s earliest named peoples
The Thamud entered written history around the eighth century B.C.E., when Assyrian king Sargon II had their name carved into his palace walls at Dur-Sharrukin. Over the next thousand years, they appeared in Babylonian letters, Greek geographies, Roman military rolls, and the Quran — a rare, layered glimpse into pre-Islamic Arabian life.