Saudi Arabia, with a population of about 30 million, spends lavishly on domestic

programs and foreign aid. When King Salman ascended to the throne in January, after the
death of King Abdullah, he promised in his first speech to improve education and expand
health care. The Saudi budget was in deficit in 2014, despite strong oil prices for most of
the year. The government forecasts a 2015 budget gap of 145 billion riyals ($39 billion),
and it will be wider if oil prices dont rebound.
Our ultimate aim is to diversify away from our overreliance on oil revenues, the
petroleum minister, Ali al-Naimi , said at a 2013 seminar in Washington. The centerpiece
of that effort is the establishment of the King Abdullah University of Science and
Technology on the Red Sea, north of Jeddah. Naimi, who was CEO of state oil producer
Saudi Aramco before becoming petroleum minister, recounted how, at a council of
ministers meeting in 2006, the monarch took his hand and asked if he could build a
university. I said: Your Majesty, we have builtI mean, Saudi Aramco has builta lot
of refineries, gas plants, pipelines, some housing. But universities? No. But we can, if
you want. And we did.

The schools mission, as Naimi articulates it, is nothing less than to lead Saudi Arabia
into the post-hydrocarbon age. The campus, built for 220 professors and 2,000 graduate
students, is a bastion of tolerance and religious liberty in a country often criticized for
having neither. Heavily armed guards on land and at sea protect the facility, where
unveiled women study and work side by side with men, undisturbed by the religious
police who patrol Saudi cities. Research there is aimed at scientific and commercial
breakthroughs using those things Saudi Arabia has in abundance, such as sun, sand, and
saltwater. When he discusses retirement, Naimi says its to devote more time to the
institution.