The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources was established in 1984 and entrusted with administering and organizing the energy sector in a way that achieves the national objectives.
In light of the restructuring process, the responsibilities of the ministry were amended to include the comprehensive planning process of the energy and mineral resource sector, and setting the general plans and ensuring their implementation in a way that achieves the general objectives of the sector; the most important of which is providing energy, in its various forms, for the development process and organizing its affairs, in addition to the optimum utilization of natural resources complying with international best practices.
Vision: Achieving a secure sustainable supply of energy and optimal utilization of natural resources.
Mission: Setting and developing the appropriate policies and legislations to achieve a secure sustainable
supply of energy and that the optimum utilization of natural resources complies with international best practices.
Core Values: Teamwork Spirit, Knowledge Dissemination and Use, Integrity and Transparency, Excellence and Entrepreneurship, Loyalty and Affiliation.
Natural Gas DirectorateThrough the Natural Gas Directorate, the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources is seeking to achieve the strategic goal of increasing the contribution of natural gas in the total energy mix. This will be achieved through the development of local sources of natural gas; expanding the use of natural gas in power generation and industries; and securing additional sources of natural gas to the Kingdom. To achieve this strategic goal, the Natural Gas Directorate follows up and manages gas projects and programs across the Kingdom.
Oil Shale in JordanJordan has more than 70 billion tons of sub-surface proven reserves of oil shale, which is more than 7 billion ton oil-equivalent. The national strategy for the energy sector has included Oil Shale as an alternative energy source to contribute about 12% of the energy mix in the Kingdom in 2025.
The Government has adopted a Commercial Legal Framework and an Environmental Legal Framework within the contracts with the investing companies to govern and control oil shale exploitation projects with the help of the relevant international consultancy firms. A national exploration program has been scheduled and implemented to investigate new potential areas for investment throughout the Kingdom for new exploitation projects, for both the deep seated resource and the surface resource to produce both oil and electricity.
The Government is currently adopting a three-track approach to handle Oil Shale resource exploitation which includes In Situ for the deep Oil Shale to produce oil, Surface Retorting for the mined Oil Shale to produce oil, and Direct Burning of Oil Shale for Electricity Generation.
Renewable EnergyJordan has been exploring opportunities to develop renewable and energy-efficient sources of power in order to reduce the country’s reliance on imported fossil fuels and to reduce Jordan’s greenhouse gas emissions. Jordan targets the share of renewable energy in the country’s generated electricity to be 20% by 2020.
In terms of installed capacity, the “Jordan 2025” plan targets an increase in the share of renewable energy in Jordan’s installed electrical capacity from 1.5% in 2014 to 25% by 2025. As a result, the government has established various policy and regulatory frameworks to support renewable energy generation in the Kingdom.
In 2012, the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Law was passed. Pursuant to this law, investors may identify and propose potential electricity production projects including wind, solar and waste-toenergy projects, to the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources for consideration. In addition to the various large-scale power projects underway in the Kingdom, the government supports small-scale renewable electricity generation projects and permits the sale of surplus electricity generated at a fixed tariff. As a result of this, Jordan now has more than 730 MW of installed wind and power projects (including small scale projects). These projects produces more than 7% of the total consumed electricity in Jordan. The total current contracted capacity is around 1736 MW. The total installed capacity by 2021 is expected to reach 20%.