A leading climate scientist for Neom has warned that this futuristic megacity in the desert could alter weather patterns and amplify wind and sand storms.

Construction of Neom’s sprawling 25,500km² megacity has been far from a smooth road. Located in the Saudi desert near the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba, the project aims “to change how people live and look after the planet”. 

First announced by Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in 2017, the ambition is for Neom to be an independent, liberal, high-tech megacity with its own tax and labour laws and judiciary. 

It includes the 170km-long The Line – a linear skyscraper city of narrow buildings up to 500 metres high, encased in a mirrored glass façade.

While the ambitions for Neom are indeed lofty, work on the project has been very slow with various delays, cost overruns and controversy. 

Towards the end of last year, Neom’s boss of six years Nadhmi al-Nasr abruptly left the project. A new acting chief executive Aiman al-Mudaifer soon took over to help turn the project around. 

In March, a report by The Wall Street Journal found that the project could face another 55 years of construction, with a projected cost of $8.8tn – substantially more than its initial estimated cost of $500bn.

In an article published by the Financial Times (FT), Donald Wuebbles, professor of atmospheric science at the University of Illinois, a lead author of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports and a paid adviser to Neom, said he has repeatedly raised the question of the impact this sprawling megacity is likely to have on the local environment and weather systems.

Wuebbles told the FT: “Part of my concern was the impact The Line and those [projects] [are] going to have on the local environment ... you start affecting the local weather and climate.”

The damaging effects could include changes to rain patterns and amplification of wind and storms in the desert area, which have “not been studied enough,” he said. 

Research has previously shown that the typically higher temperatures in cities can alter the surrounding air currents and cloud formations. This results in summer storms intensifying over urban areas.

With a project of this size, there are other environmental impacts including emissions from Neom’s use of cement and the carbon emissions from the many combustion engine vehicles and machinery being used for its construction. 

It has already been reported that Neom is using one-fifth of the entire world’s available steel.

According to the FT article, Neom claims sustainability is a core priority. It aims to have a lower environmental impact “compared to traditional construction projects”, with the use of more sustainable concrete and localised building material construction.

Wuebbles is far from completely negative about Neom. He told the FT he was impressed with the project’s use of technology, and hoped it could one day become a model for sustainable cities of the future. 

He said: “They’re trying to do something like a moonshot: nothing like this has been done before, and there’s so much that could be learned.”

E+T’s March/April 2025 issue included a detailed feature on Neom and Saudi Arabia’s race to complete the megacity ahead of the 2034 World Cup.