Saudi Arabia Cuts Neom's The Line by 98% as Cash Reserves Drop

Patrick Boyle

Unrealistic transit physics, multi-trillion-dollar construction costs, and dwindling wealth fund reserves forced Saudi Arabia to reduce The Line to a fraction of its planned scale.

AI-assisted summary of Neom - The Line - The Rise and Fall of Saudi Arabia's Linear City. — original source. Check the original for full context.

Source published: 2024-04-16

Key ideas

Saudi Arabia has drastically scaled back medium-term plans for its linear megacity, The Line, reducing the projected 2030 length from 170 km to just 2.4 km—a 98.6% contraction—while cutting the expected population from 9 million to fewer than 300,000. (3:26)
Financial strains have mounted as the Public Investment Fund's cash reserves fell to $5 billion as of September, prompting debt issuance, further stake sales in Saudi Aramco, and an unapproved 2024 budget for Neom. (3:26)
Independent cost analyses reveal massive funding disparities; constructing the exterior mirrored facade alone would require the equivalent of 4,540 Taipei 101 skyscrapers, costing roughly $9.1 trillion against an official budget of only $200 billion to $500 billion. (23:21)
Environmental researchers from SKEMA Business School warn that constructing The Line will release approximately 1.8 gigatons of CO2, easily negating any long-term operational efficiencies promised by smart-city technology. (29:28)

Detailed notes

## Background This video was published on YouTube by financial commentator Patrick Boyle on April 16, 2024. According to the page description, it covers Saudi Arabia's dramatic scaling back of its ambitious megaproject, "The Line"—a planned 170-kilometer-long mirrored desert city intended for 9 million people that has been curtailed to just 2.4 kilometers and fewer than 300,000 residents amid unapproved 2024 budgets reported by Bloomberg.

## TL;DR Patrick Boyle examines the architectural, physical, and financial absurdities of Saudi Arabia's flagship Vision 2030 megaproject, Neom and The Line. He breaks down how the original 170-kilometer, 500-meter-tall linear city relied on unfeasible engineering concepts—including impossible Mach 3 transit systems and trillions of dollars in exterior wall construction—alongside outlandish consultant proposals like glowing sand and robot dinosaurs. Boyle contrasts the state's utopian green marketing with the harsh realities of strained sovereign wealth reserves, a 98.6% project downscaling, forced tribal evictions, massive upfront carbon emissions, and the Kingdom's historical track record of half-empty master-planned desert cities.

## Atmosphere & style The presentation is marked by Boyle's signature dry, deadpan sarcasm and razor-sharp financial wit. He balances heavy geopolitical and humanitarian reporting with comedic self-preservation jokes, mock-enthusiastically praising autocratic vanity projects while playfully warning himself away from Saudi embassy receptions. Listening to the video feels like an entertaining, unsparing reality check, peeling away glossy promotional CGI to reveal basic mathematical impossibilities and fiscal recklessness.

## Bulletin - [03:26](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=206s) Saudi Arabia has drastically scaled back medium-term plans for its linear megacity, The Line, reducing the projected 2030 length from 170 km to just 2.4 km—a 98.6% contraction—while cutting the expected population from 9 million to fewer than 300,000. - [03:26](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=206s) Financial strains have mounted as the Public Investment Fund's cash reserves fell to $5 billion as of September, prompting debt issuance, further stake sales in Saudi Aramco, and an unapproved 2024 budget for Neom. - [23:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1401s) Independent cost analyses reveal massive funding disparities; constructing the exterior mirrored facade alone would require the equivalent of 4,540 Taipei 101 skyscrapers, costing roughly $9.1 trillion against an official budget of only $200 billion to $500 billion. - [29:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1768s) Environmental researchers from SKEMA Business School warn that constructing The Line will release approximately 1.8 gigatons of CO2, easily negating any long-term operational efficiencies promised by smart-city technology.

## Key takeaways - [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=0s) Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman launched The Line as the centerpiece of Vision 2030, proposing a 170-km-long, 500-meter-tall mirrored desert skyscraper designed to house 9 million people. - [03:26](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=206s) Bloomberg revealed a 98.6% reduction in The Line's 2030 targets, scaling back its expected footprint to 2.4 km and population to under 300,000 amid sovereign wealth fund cash crunches. - [06:37](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=397s) Urban planning research shows organic cities expand as fractals to optimize resource interface, making a narrow 170-km linear layout mathematically inefficient and transit-hostile. - [11:49](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=709s) The advertised 20-minute transit time across 170 km is physically impossible with conventional stations; stopping at realistic intervals would require Mach 3 travel speeds and dangerous acceleration rates. - [17:13](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1033s) Global consulting firms drafted thousands of pages filled with unproven concepts for the project, including robot dinosaurs, glowing sand, cloud seeding, and human genome editing. - [20:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1228s) The project faces severe human rights backlash over the forced eviction of the indigenous Huwaitat tribe, resulting in one death, three death sentences, and lengthy prison terms for dissenting locals. - [23:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1401s) At a height of 500 meters, building both walls of The Line is structurally equivalent to building 4,540 Taipei 101 skyscrapers, which would cost at least $9.1 trillion for the facades alone. - [23:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1401s) Providing adequate electricity for 9 million residents in an arid climate would demand 5,000+ MW, likely requiring four to five commercial nuclear reactors costing upwards of $30 billion to $40 billion. - [27:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1648s) Saudi Arabia's rentier economy remains heavily dependent on hydrocarbons, with oil and gas generating 84% of exports and public sector payrolls supporting two-thirds of employed citizens. - [29:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1768s) Despite bold sustainability claims, IEA figures indicate Saudi renewable energy penetration stands at only 0.1%, while construction emissions for The Line will release 1.8 gigatons of CO2. - [31:46](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1906s) Saudi Arabia has a history of underperforming desert megacities, such as King Abdullah Economic City, which houses around 10,000 people compared to its original 2-million-resident projection.

## Detailed walkthrough ### [00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=0s) The Grand Vision of Neom and "The Line"

Saudi Arabia's high-profile megaproject, "The Line," was announced as a 170-kilometer-long city cutting across the desert, originally projected to cost $200 billion and house 9 million people. The proposed structure is colossal: 200 meters wide and 500 meters tall—making it taller than most of the world's skyscrapers—situated in an allegedly vacant stretch of arid land. Pitch decks and promotional materials framed it as an ultra-futuristic smart city packed with extreme, science-fiction amenities: an artificial moon, robot dinosaurs, flying cars, human gene editing, and sand engineered to glow in the dark. A report from *The Wall Street Journal* noted that the chosen corner of northwestern Saudi Arabia is so barren that an external consulting team could identify only two abundant natural resources: sunlight and unlimited access to saltwater.

Patrick Boyle wryly notes that while real estate adages claim "location, location, location" are the key variables, location is supposedly only one factor, leaving room for at least two other considerations. Adopting a nervous tone about critiquing the project, Boyle jokes about self-preservation, pointing to the fate of earlier critics who questioned the prudence of pouring half a trillion dollars into an unproven, autocratic desert megaproject. Playing a clip of a commentator warning that “it could bankrupt the country, but no one's allowed to criticize it,” Boyle quips that he might need to keep a low profile, avoid accepting invitations to Saudi embassy receptions—no matter how many Ferrero Rocher chocolates are on offer—and disclaim past videos where he ridiculed the sovereign wealth fund’s lavish spending habits. He jokes that past clips mocking Neom as a city designed to keep residents at the maximum possible distance from their destinations must have been generated by AI, since his channel is strictly devoted to being the premier "crypto nerd gangster rap channel on YouTube."

[03:26](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=206s) The Bloomberg Bombshell: A 98.6% Retraction

Despite the grand rhetoric, the financial and physical realities of the megaproject have caught up with the Kingdom. Bloomberg reported that Saudi Arabia has dramatically scaled back its medium-term ambitions for The Line. The Kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund (the Public Investment Fund, or PIF) had not yet approved Neom’s 2024 budget, as the multi-trillion-dollar scale of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 initiative—intended to diversify the Saudi economy away from fossil fuels—began stoking deep concern at the highest levels of government.

According to Bloomberg, the sovereign wealth fund's cash reserves dwindled to $5 billion as of September, marking their lowest reserves since 2020. Consequently, projections for The Line were drastically slashed: rather than extending 170 kilometers and accommodating millions of residents by 2030, the city is now expected to measure just 2.4 kilometers long and house fewer than 300,000 residents by the end of the decade. As Patrick Boyle puts it: “This is a 98.6% reduction from the initial plans so it's still going ahead it'll just be a little bit smaller than had been hoped for.”

- **Original planned length:** 170 kilometers (105.6 miles) - **Revised 2030 length:** 2.4 kilometers (a 98.6% reduction) - **Original population goal:** 9,000,000 residents - **Revised 2030 population target:** Under 300,000 residents - **Initial headline budget:** ~$200 billion (later estimated at $500B to over $1 trillion) - **PIF cash reserves (Sept):** $5 billion (lowest level since 2020)

[05:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=300s) Sponsor: DeleteMe

Boyle transitions to a sponsor message for DeleteMe, an online privacy subscription service designed to remove personal information from the open web. He explains that data brokers harvest immense quantities of personally identifiable information—including Social Security numbers, dates of birth, current and prior addresses, and details about family members—to bundle into searchable profiles sold to the public, scammers, and identity thieves. While individuals technically have the legal right to request data removal from these brokers, doing so manually across hundreds of separate registries is deliberately complicated and time-consuming. Boyle highlights that DeleteMe handles the removal requests and follow-ups on the subscriber's behalf, continually monitoring data broker directories so personal records are not quietly relisted.

[06:37](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=397s) Royal Succession, "Figurative" Foundations, and the Shape of Cities

The political engine behind Neom began in 2017, when King Salman reshuffled the Saudi line of succession, bypassing his nephew to appoint his son, Prince Mohammed bin Salman (often abbreviated as MBS, which Boyle jokes usually stands for "mortgage-backed securities"). Just four months after ascending to crown prince, MBS introduced Neom—a name portmanteauing the ancient Greek *neo* (new) and the Arabic *mustaqbal* (future). MBS personally chairs the sovereign wealth fund bankrolling the development.

Promotional materials released on Neom’s official YouTube channel continued to claim rapid progress, boasting the world's largest round-the-clock earthworks operation moving millions of cubic meters of earth and water each week. In the video, a project representative declared, “We've done a lot of the foundation work literally and figuratively we are ready to go.” Official statements had previously maintained that hotels, an airport, and residential facilities would be open to accommodate tourists and residents by early 2024.

Boyle points out the absurdity of the architecture itself: a structure 500 meters high but only 200 meters wide. While skyscrapers throughout human history were constructed on expensive, dense urban plots where high land prices necessitated building vertical density to amortize land costs, Neom sits in an empty desert where land is practically free. Citing academic research on urban geometry by Brinkley and Raj, Boyle notes that organic cities grow as fractals:

```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: Organic Fractal Urban Growth vs The Line accDescr: Diagram contrasting how natural cities expand as fractals to absorb resources versus Neom's linear structure.

subgraph Fractal["Organic City Growth (Brinkley & Raj)"] A["Core Settlement"] --> B["Resource Interface"] B --> C["Radial Branches / Fractals"] C --> D["Maximizes Access to Water, Arable Land & Trade"] end

subgraph Linear["The Line Megaproject"] E["First Desert Block"] -->|"Questionable location"| F["Next Block Built Further Away"] F --> G["170 km Linear Wall"] G --> H["Maximizes Internal Transit Distance"] end ```

Brinkley and Raj argue that cities behave like biological cells suspended in a growth medium of arable land, branching outward to maximize perfusion, transport efficiency, and resource uptake. By contrast, building a hyper-dense, tall ribbon in an inhospitable desert defies all natural urban mechanics. Boyle jokes that the form makes sense only if you assume the starting location was so undesirable that each subsequent building had to be constructed further away from the last, until the city “would then naturally form a line as it tries to get away from itself.”

[11:49](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=709s) The High-Speed Transit Paradox

The most glaring engineering fantasy of The Line is its internal transit system. Because a 170-kilometer straight line guarantees that residents are located as far as mathematically possible from one another, planners pledged that high-speed rail running through the spine would transport passengers end-to-end in 20 minutes with zero car usage. Boyle analyzes the elementary physics of this claim:

1. **Direct Non-Stop Travel:** Traversing 170 kilometers in 20 minutes without intermediate stops demands a constant velocity of 510 km/h (roughly 317 mph)—faster than the operating speed of any commercial train service on Earth. 2. **Standard Station Spacing:** Urban transit systems like the London Underground or the New York City Subway place stations roughly every quarter of a mile. Spanning The Line’s 105.6 miles at that frequency would require 412 distinct stations. 3. **The Dwell Time Problem:** Even standard subway trains hold their doors open for roughly 30 seconds per stop to let passengers board and alight. Across 412 stations, that dwell time alone totals 206 minutes of stationary waiting time—ten times longer than the promised 20-minute total journey. 4. **The Impossible Scenario:** If dwell times were artificially compressed to an absurd 2 seconds per station, the train would still sit stationary for 14 minutes across the line. That leaves only 6 minutes of travel time to clear the 170-kilometer distance, requiring an operating transit speed of 1,700 km/h (over 1,000 mph)—well past the sound barrier inside a populated residential superstructure.

[13:46](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=826s) The Physics of the Hyperloop and Mach 3 Commuting

Patrick Boyle breaks down the sheer physical absurdity of traveling the entire length of The Line in 20 minutes, noting that achieving such a transit time across multiple stops would require extreme rates of acceleration and deceleration. The top speed would have to exceed 1,000 miles per hour, giving passengers roughly two seconds to board or exit before the train hurtles forward at up to three times the speed of sound, only to slam on the brakes for the next station. As Boyle dryly notes, the loss of blood pressure to the brain during such violent acceleration could trigger G-induced loss of consciousness (G-LOC): “I won't lie to you, it sounds a little bit stressful to me; you'd have to get your seat belt on rather quickly.”

Naturally, the only proposed technology capable of such speeds was Elon Musk's Hyperloop. Neom officially partnered with Hyperloop One in 2020 to bring this vision to life. However, Hyperloop One abruptly shut down just a few months prior, leading Boyle to joke that this minor operational snag is probably what is holding things up at Neom. Even so, he muses that it cannot be that hard to replace, since it is basically “like a tube with an air hockey table.” For his part, Boyle quips that none of this really matters to him, as he intends to get around in one of the autonomous flying cars prominently featured in the promotional materials, advising: “The rest of you should probably just walk.”

Official marketing boasts that residents will have access to all daily necessities within a five-minute walk, which Boyle suspects will be the preferred option anyway to avoid getting stuck in the doors of a supersonic transit tube. When questioned about the plausibility of the project in the *Financial Times*, Neom project advisor Ali Shahabi defended the concept: > “Look, I think you have to go beyond the glitz and the futuristic videos and the hyperbolic language that comes from Western consultants, and I think what Neom has failed to explain properly is that there is substance below this.”

When asked whether he would personally want to live in The Line, Shahabi admitted: > “I'm too old to live in The Line; I think The Line is going to attract Saudis in their 20s and 30s.”

Boyle concurs, joking that enduring Mach 3 acceleration and decelerating to a full stop over 400 times in a single 20-minute journey is very much “a young man's game.”

- **Planned transit specs**: Traveling the full 170-kilometer route in 20 minutes with intermediate stops requires speeds over 1,000 mph (Mach 3). - **Extreme density**: The planned 9 million inhabitants would occupy a land footprint of just 34 square kilometers (13 square miles). - **Density comparison**: Manila holds the current world record for city population density at 119,600 people per square mile; The Line would pack in 686,000 people per square mile—nearly six times that of Manila.

---

[17:13](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1033s) The Consultant Wishlist: Flying Cabs, Robot Maids, and Glowing Sand

Turning to the internal planning of the city, Boyle references a 2019 report by *The Wall Street Journal*, which reviewed 2,300 pages of strategy documents drafted by major Western consultancies including Boston Consulting Group (BCG), McKinsey & Company, and Oliver Wyman. Under the direction of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) to turn his grand ideas into reality, these firms assembled proposals packed with speculative or non-existent technologies. These included flying taxis, cloud seeding to generate desert rain, robotic maids, a robotic dinosaur park, and scientists tasked with human gene editing to make residents physically stronger.

```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: Neom Consultant Speculative Concept Ecosystem accDescr: High-level overview of the technologies and civic proposals included in Neom consultancy documents.

subgraph Tech["Futuristic & Speculative Tech"] A["Autonomous Flying Cars & Cabs"] B["Cloud Seeding for Rainfall"] C["Robotic Dinosaurs & Robot Cage Fighting"] D["Human Genome Editing"] end

subgraph Cityscape["Civic & Urban Features"] E["Glow-in-the-Dark Sand Beach"] F["Giant Artificial Live-Streaming Moon"] G["Holographic School Teachers"] end

subgraph Surveillance["Surveillance & Governance"] H["24/7 Facial Recognition Drones & Cameras"] I["Fully AI-Automated Legal System"] J["Metaverse, Crypto & NFT Marketplace"] end

Tech --> Cityscape Cityscape --> Surveillance ```

The proposals also detailed night-time entertainment featuring robot cage fighting, a giant artificial moon that would illuminate the desert while live-streaming images from outer space, and a beach with glowing sand like the luminescent dial of a wristwatch. Boyle jokes that perhaps the radiation from the glowing sand is intended to handle the gene editing, effectively killing two birds with one stone. Pervasive surveillance via drones, cameras, and facial recognition software would monitor every citizen around the clock to keep everyone safe—a system Boyle ironically notes would eliminate the need for him to record videos, as he could simply live-stream his entire life constantly.

Addressing *The Wall Street Journal's* assertion that relying on foreign consultants highlighted Saudi Arabia's historical lack of urban planning, engineering, and management expertise, Boyle observes mockingly: > “I'll tell you, there's no sign of a lack of those skills in this project plan to me; the rest of the world appears to be lagging behind.”

The planning documents also promised an urban paradise free of work-related stress diseases, with every resident employed at a startup, alongside holographic teachers leading classrooms and open-air farmers markets operating in the middle of the desert.

---

[20:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1228s) Floating Cities, Displacement, and Tourism in an Authoritarian State

Beyond The Line itself, Neom's promotional releases outline an eight-sided floating city on the Red Sea (Oxagon) operating an AI-run judiciary system, alongside an exclusive metaverse platform designed for immersive digital retail, NFT trading, and virtual transport to Mars. The city claims it will run on 100% renewable energy with complete water desalination and natural ventilation microclimates—vital requirements given that Saudi Arabia lacks any permanent lakes or rivers and receives negligible rainfall.

Boyle contrasts these utopian technological fantasies with the grim humanitarian cost documented by international observers. While consultants were designing glowing beaches and metaverse malls, plans were executed to forcibly displace the region's indigenous Huwaitat tribe. Citing reports from *The Guardian*, Boyle highlights that local tribespeople have been violently evicted without fair compensation: - A tribesman was shot dead in 2020 after refusing to surrender his ancestral land for the project. - Three tribesmen who resisted eviction are currently facing execution. - Another three tribal residents received prison sentences ranging from 27 to 50 years.

While the Saudi tourism board presents the region as untouched virgin territory destined to attract international vacationers, Boyle sarcastically questions the appeal of such a destination for typical tourists: > “I know that when I think of a good place to go on holiday, I always search for the most authoritarian theocratic dictatorship in the world, especially when they've built a new city with cameras, drones, and facial recognition technology to allow intelligent services to track everyone at all times to keep them safe, and I'm sure that you feel the same.”

---

[23:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1401s) The Astounding Cost: Comparing The Line to Taipei 101

Boyle turns to the financial engineering behind The Line, ironically praising MBS for negotiating what appears to be an impossible bargain compared to historical infrastructure construction costs. Standing 500 meters high, The Line matches the height of Taiwan's Taipei 101—once the tallest skyscraper in the world, which cost roughly $2 billion to build two decades ago. Because Taipei 101 has a width of 75 meters, it would take 13.3 equivalent towers laid edge-to-edge to construct just one single kilometer of The Line.

Building both parallel walls across the planned 170-kilometer span requires an astonishing volume of structural construction: - **Wall requirements**: 2,270 Taipei 101 equivalents per side, totaling 4,540 full skyscraper equivalents just to form the exterior mirrored facade. - **Estimated wall cost**: At $2 billion per tower, the exterior walls alone would cost roughly $9.1 trillion—assuming building costs have not risen over the past 20 years. - **Excluded interior infrastructure**: This $9.1 trillion estimate completely excludes the internal architecture, transit tubes, floating gardens, desalination plants, sewage treatment works, flying pod networks, and the artificial moon.

Providing adequate utilities represents another monumental financial barrier. Boyle estimates that a city of 9 million residents would require at least 5,000 megawatts of electricity per day—likely far higher given the heavy demands of water desalination and constant air conditioning in a desert climate. Using New York City as a point of comparison (which consumes massive power and draws one-third of its supply from four nuclear plants), Boyle suggests that even an hyper-efficient Line would require four to five commercial nuclear reactors. At Synapse Energy's cost estimates of $6 billion to $9 billion per plant, establishing the power grid alone would swallow $30 billion to $40 billion.

```mermaid flowchart LR accTitle: The Line Construction Budget vs Wall Cost Reality accDescr: Bar-style flow comparing the official Saudi budget to the estimated cost of the exterior facade alone.

subgraph OfficialBudget["Official Saudi Estimates"] direction TB B1["Original Budget: $200B"] B2["Revised Estimate: $500B"] end

subgraph RealWorldCost["Exterior Walls Only (4,540 Taipei 101s)"] direction TB W1["Baseline: $9.1 Trillion"] W2["Plus: $30B–$40B Power Plants"] W3["Plus: Desalination, Transit & Interiors"] end

OfficialBudget -.->|"Underfunded by > 95%"| RealWorldCost ```

MBS originally claimed the entire megacity could be completed for $200 billion—less than 2% of Boyle's estimate for just the two outer walls. Although the official budget estimate was later adjusted upward to $500 billion, Boyle points out that popular science creator thunderf00t calculated a realistic total price tag closer to $100 trillion, which would consume the entire gross domestic product of Saudi Arabia for a century. Boyle playfully dismisses such pessimism, concluding that critics fail to account for the economic explosion that will occur once Saudi Arabia pivots from oil to startup incubators and begins exporting carbon-neutral autonomous flying cars.

[27:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1648s) Architectural Skepticism and the "Rentier State" Economy

The ambitious promotional material for Neom promises everything from hologram teachers and NFT trading to video tourism that anticipates drawing more visitors annually than Paris by 2030. British architect Peter Cook, who has worked on the project, offered a much more grounded perspective when questioned about the reality of the construction. He candidly predicted that the development team would merely manage to complete "a bit of it," dismissing the proposed 500-meter height as fundamentally impractical and noting that engineers readily identify the structural foolishness of such verticality. Patrick Boyle contrasts these professional assessments with deadpan irony, observing that an extreme 500-meter height seems just as crucial to a modern development as sand that glows like a watch face or cage-fighting robots.

Beneath these extravagant proposals lies the reality of Saudi Arabia's underlying economic framework. The country functions primarily on fossil fuel exports, with oil and gas driving 84% of exports and representing 42% of gross domestic product. Domestic citizens rarely perform manual labor or work low-tier service jobs, relying instead on millions of imported foreign workers. As a classic neopatrimonial rentier state, the kingdom recycles its resource revenues into public-sector payrolls. Two-thirds of employed Saudi nationals work directly for the government, where men typically earn double the salary of their private-sector counterparts, despite a former civil service minister publicly acknowledging in 2016 that many public employees perform roughly an hour of real work each day.

- Architectural consultant Peter Cook described the proposed 500-meter elevation as “a bit stupid,” noting that “all of our engineer friends will tell you this.” - Saudi Arabia’s national output remains tied to hydrocarbons: oil and gas account for 84% of export value and 42% of GDP. - Public payrolls support 66% of employed Saudi citizens, where male government salaries average double the market rates found in the private sector. - In 2016, Saudi Arabia's Civil Service Minister admitted that many state sector workers average only about one hour of productive work per day.

---

[29:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1768s) Vision 2030, Soaring Debts, and Greenwashing Criticisms

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman conceived Vision 2030 to steer the domestic economy away from petroleum dependence and reposition the kingdom as a global center of technological innovation. Beyond spectacle megaprojects like The Line, the strategic initiative promotes increased female workforce participation, broader foreign direct investment, expanded cultural tourism, and educational upgrades designed to foster a knowledge economy. However, the capital expenditures required for these initiatives have severely strained the national treasury. Reports indicate that conventional oil revenues can no longer cover the surging price tags, forcing the state to issue debt and divest tranches of the state oil company, Saudi Aramco, to keep construction capitalized. Domestic consumers have felt the pinch as well: in 2020, authorities raised the value-added tax (VAT) from 5% to 15%, a surcharge locals colloquially dubbed the "Neom tax."

Environmental analysts and academic researchers have labeled Neom's sustainability claims as blatant greenwashing. While the state announced an aggressive target to generate 50% of the country's electricity from renewable energy by 2030, International Energy Agency (IEA) metrics show renewable output stalled at just 0.1% with only six years left to run. Academic analysis from SKEMA Business School determined that constructing The Line will emit roughly 1.8 gigatons of carbon dioxide. The researchers determined that the colossal upfront carbon footprint of raw materials, logistics, and ongoing maintenance completely wipes out any long-term energy efficiencies smart-city technology could ever provide. Further compounding the absurdity of its ecological posturing, Neom was chosen to host the 2029 Asian Winter Games, an endeavor that requires building and chilling an artificial outdoor ski resort directly inside the arid desert.

```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: The Carbon Balance Paradox of The Line accDescr: Diagram illustrating how construction emissions outweigh future smart city carbon savings.

subgraph Upfront ["High-Impact Phase"] A["Raw Materials Extraction & Transport"] --> C["Massive Construction Footprint"] B["Site Infrastructure & Excavation"] --> C C --> D["1.8 Gigatons CO2 Generated"] end

subgraph Operation ["Theoretical Smart City"] E["Zero-Carbon Operational Tech"] --> F["Speculative Future Savings"] end

D -->|"Heavily Outweighs"| F ```

- Vision 2030 encompasses broader structural reforms, including integrating women into the labor market, courting foreign capital, and expanding secular tourism. - Financial pressure forced the kingdom into borrowing and divesting shares of state oil giant Aramco, alongside hiking the domestic VAT rate threefold from 5% to 15%. - Against an official target of reaching 50% grid power from renewable resources by 2030, IEA records indicate renewable penetration stands at a negligible 0.1%. - SKEMA Business School researchers calculated that building The Line would unleash approximately 1.8 gigatons of CO2, arguing that “while smart cities promise zero carbon thanks to new technologies, their construction, operation, and supply requirements are so environmentally costly that it outweighs any carbon reduction that might be attained in the future.”

---

[31:46](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1906s) Past Desert Megacities and Track Record Failures

The kingdom has repeatedly attempted to build master-planned urban environments from scratch in an effort to diversify away from energy exports. In 2005, the government unveiled a $30 billion program to construct six brand-new economic cities across the desert. Official forecasts claimed the network would attract international corporate investment, generate over one million private-sector jobs, and deliver an additional $150 billion to gross domestic product.

Of the six planned metropolises, only King Abdullah Economic City (KAEC) reached completion. Rather than housing the 2 million residents promised by state planners, KAEC remains virtually empty with a population lingering around 10,000 people. Skeptics suggest the project only avoided total abandonment because its survival was protected by carrying the moniker of the reigning monarch. Patrick Boyle concludes the overview with dry sarcasm, reassuring the audience that any pessimism regarding Neom originates with outside critics rather than his own evaluation of the speculative linear venture.

- In 2005, Saudi Arabia pledged $30 billion to erect six new desert cities to capture $150 billion in GDP growth and add one million jobs. - Only one site was finished: King Abdullah Economic City, which holds approximately 10,000 residents against an original target of 2 million. - Cynics argue that KAEC only saw completion because it was named in honor of the reigning monarch at the time.

## Notable quotes > [29:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=1768s) while smart cities promise zero carbon thanks to new technologies, their construction, operation, and supply requirements are so environmentally costly that it outweighs any carbon reduction that might be attained in the future. — SKEMA Business School researchers

> [13:46](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg&t=826s) I think you have to go beyond the glitz and the futuristic videos and the hyperbolic language that comes from Western consultants, and I think what Neom has failed to explain properly is that there is substance below this. — Ali Shahabi

## Mentioned Neom, The Line, Mohammed bin Salman, Public Investment Fund, Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, The Guardian, DeleteMe, Brinkley, Raj, Hyperloop One, Elon Musk, Ali Shahabi, Boston Consulting Group, McKinsey & Company, Oliver Wyman, Oxagon, Huwaitat tribe, Taipei 101, Synapse Energy, thunderf00t, Peter Cook, Saudi Aramco, International Energy Agency, SKEMA Business School, Asian Winter Games, King Abdullah Economic City

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Saudi Arabia’s plan to build a 170km long, 500m tall, mirrored city in the desert as one of their megaprojects filled with 9 million people has now been curtailed to 2.4km long.

According to Bloomberg, Saudi Arabia’s government has “scaled back its medium-term ambitions” for Neom, of which The Line is the most significant sub-project.

The Saudi government had hoped to have 9 million residents living in "The Line" by 2030, but this has been scaled back to fewer than 300,000, according to the new report.

This curtailment of plans comes as Saudi Arabia has not yet approved the 2024 budget for Neom, according to Bloomberg sources.

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[Source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ak4on5uTaTg)

中文简报

资金储备缩水沙特将Neom“The Line”缩减98% 不切实际的交通物理设想、数万亿美元的建造成本以及不断减少的主权财富基金储备，迫使沙特阿拉伯将“The Line”大幅缩减至原计划规模的一小部分。 Patrick Boyle深入探讨了沙特阿拉伯“2030愿景”旗舰超级项目Neom及其核心“The Line”在建筑、物理和财务层面的荒谬之处。他剖析了原计划长170公里、高500米的设计如何依赖不可行的工程概念——包括不可能实现的3马赫轨道交通系统和高达数万亿美元的外墙建造成本——以及发光沙滩和机器恐龙等顾问提出的离奇方案。Boyle将沙特官方宣传的绿色乌托邦与残酷现实进行了对比：紧张的主权财富储备、规模缩减98.6%、部落居民被迫搬迁、巨大的前期碳排放，以及沙特以往规划建设的沙漠城市往往半途荒废、入住率低的历史记录。沙特阿拉伯已大幅缩减其线性超级城市“The Line”的中期规划，将2030年的预计完工长度从170公里缩减至仅2.4公里（缩水98.6%），同时将预期人口从900万削减至不足30万。 (3:26) 随着沙特公共投资基金（PIF）的现金储备截至9月降至50亿美元，财务压力不断加剧，促使沙特发行债务、进一步出售沙特阿美股份，并导致Neom的2024年预算未能获批。 (3:26) 独立成本分析显示出巨大的资金缺口；仅建造外部镜面外墙就需要相当于4540座台北101大楼的工程量，耗资约9.1万亿美元，而官方预算仅为2000亿至5000亿美元。 (23:21) SKEMA商学院的环境研究人员警告称，建造“The Line”将排放约18亿吨二氧化碳，轻而易举抵消智慧城市技术所承诺的任何长期运营减排效益。 (29:28)

Reading summary

Patrick Boyle examines Saudi Arabia's flagship Vision 2030 megacity, The Line, arguing that its futuristic ambitions are colliding with physical, logistical, and financial realities, resulting in drastic cutbacks. Severe Downsizing and Strained Sovereign Finances (3:26) Originally conceived as a 170-kilometer-long, 500-meter-tall linear structure intended to house 9 million people, The Line has faced sharp retrenchment. Bloomberg reported that by late 2023, the Public Investment Fund's (PIF) cash reserves dropped to $5 billion—the lowest level since 2020—while Neom's 2024 budget remained unapproved amid broader fiscal strain across the multi-trillion-dollar Vision 2030 initiative. Consequently, Saudi projections for 2030 were cut by 98.6%. Instead of reaching 170 kilometers, authorities now expect to complete only 2.4 kilometers to house fewer than 300,000 residents by the end of the decade. Rising expenditures have pushed the kingdom to take on debt, sell tranches of state oil company Saudi Aramco, and triple the domestic value-added tax from 5% to 15%. Geometric Absurdities and Transit Realities (6:37) Boyle and cited urban researchers note that The Line's design defies foundational principles of urban economics and physics. Citing research by Brinkley and Raj, natural cities develop as fractals to maximize access to water, arable land, and commerce, whereas constructing an ultra-dense, 500-meter-tall wall in an empty desert maximizes internal transit distances without reducing land acquisition costs. Planners claimed an internal rail system would link the full 170 kilometers in 20 minutes without personal cars. However, servicing typical urban stop intervals of roughly a quarter mile would require 412 stations. Factoring in standard passenger boarding times makes a 20-minute journey mathematically impossible; even dwell times compressed to two seconds per stop would require trains to accelerate past 1,000 mph (Mach 3), risking extreme G-forces. The concept relied heavily on Hyperloop technology, though partner Hyperloop One ceased operations in late 2023. Underestimated Costs and Questionable Priorities (17:13) Strategy documents drafted by major Western consultancies like BCG, McKinsey, and Oliver Wyman featured speculative technologies, including flying taxis, robot cage fighting, human gene editing, and glowing beaches. Boyle compares the structure to Taiwan's 500-meter Taipei 101, which cost approximately $2 billion to build. Replicating that volume along two 170-kilometer facades would require roughly 4,540 tower equivalents, totaling an estimated $9.1 trillion for the outer envelope alone—dwarfing the kingdom's revised $500 billion project budget. Beyond basic construction, supplying power to the planned 9 million residents would demand at least 5,000 megawatts, likely requiring several commercial nuclear reactors at an added cost of $30 billion to $40 billion. Critics like popular science creator thunderf00t have estimated full completion costs could approach $100 trillion. Greenwashing, Human Rights, and Structural Precedents (20:28) Despite promoting a zero-carbon narrative, Neom faces intense environmental criticism. International Energy Agency data shows Saudi renewable power stalled at 0.1% against a 50% target by 2030, while hosting the 2029 Asian Winter Games requires chilling an outdoor desert ski resort. Furthermore, SKEMA Business School researchers calculated that building The Line would generate roughly 1.8 gigatons of CO2, meaning upfront manufacturing and construction emissions would wipe out theoretical smart-city operational savings. The project has also incurred severe human rights costs. The Guardian reported the forced eviction of the indigenous Huwaitat tribe, with one tribesman fatally shot in 2020, three facing execution, and others receiving prison terms of 27 to 50 years. Meanwhile, historical precedent suggests limited success: of six planned economic cities announced in 2005, only King Abdullah Economic City reached completion, currently hosting roughly 10,000 residents compared to its 2 million target. Saudi Arabia remains a classic rentier state relying on oil and gas for 84% of exports and 42% of GDP. Past grand master-planned developments and soaring fiscal burdens raise significant doubts over whether Neom can deliver a functional post-oil economic model beyond heavily curtailed initial sections.

精炼阅读摘要

金融评论员Patrick Boyle指出，沙特阿拉伯斥巨资规划的未来主义线性城市“The Line”深陷物理工程悖论、荒谬预算低估与严峻财务收缩；该项目不仅在生态和人权层面引发巨大争议，也暴露出该国食利型经济试图通过脱离现实的沙漠巨型工程实现转型的根本困境。几何悖论与超音速通勤的物理盲区 The Line最初规划为一座长170公里、宽200米、高500米的巨型线性建筑，拟在34平方公里的土地上容纳900万人。根据学者Brinkley与Raj的城市几何学研究，自然城市通常呈分形结构向外辐射生长，以最大化资源吸收和交通效率；而人为将城市拉成单维直线，反而在数学上拉大了居民彼此间的距离。其规划人口密度高达每平方英里68.6万人，接近目前世界纪录保持者马尼拉的六倍，在廉价无垠的沙漠中建造极度高耸狭窄的立面违背了基本的城市经济规律。交通工程与公共设施的虚幻指标 (11:49) 沙特官方宣称该城全线交通仅需20分钟且零汽车化。然而Boyle通过基础物理计算指出，在170公里区间内若按标准地铁间距设立412个站点，即便将每站停靠时间压缩至极其危险的2秒，列车总停靠等待时间也将达14分钟，剩余行程需以超过1000英里每小时（约3马赫）的速度运行，剧烈加减速会直接导致乘客因大脑缺血而失去知觉（G-LOC）。此外，Neom合作的Hyperloop One已宣告倒闭。在公用事业方面，支撑900万沙漠居民的电力、淡化水与空调负荷至少需4至5座商业核反应堆，仅电网建设一项据Synapse Energy的数据就需要300亿至400亿美元。财务缩编、估算黑洞与历史烂尾前科 (3:26) 沙特最初宣称整体工程耗资2000亿美元，后调高至5000亿美元乃至超1万亿美元。但Boyle比照高度相仿（500米高、75米宽）且造价约20亿美元的台北101大楼推算，仅建造170公里的双面外墙就相当于4540座台北101，造价高达9.1万亿美元，且完全不含内部基建；科普创作者thunderf00t甚至预估真实成本逼近100万亿美元。面对无法承受的财政压力，彭博社披露沙特公共投资资金（PIF）现金储备已降至50亿美元低点，官方已被迫将2030年中期目标从170公里急剧缩减98.6%至2.4公里，预计人口缩减至30万人以内。沙特早在2005年就曾计划耗资300亿美元建设六座沙漠经济城，最终仅建成的阿卜杜拉国王经济城（KAEC）常住人口仅约1万人，远低于200万的规划指标。咨询泡沫、人权代价与绿色虚标 (17:13) 《华尔街日报》披露，波士顿咨询、麦肯锡等西方咨询机构为迎合沙特王储穆罕默德·本·萨勒曼的构想，在策划案中堆砌了夜光海滩、人造发光月球、恐龙机器人、基因编辑及全天候无人机监控等脱离现实的概念。但在光鲜宣传背后，《卫报》等机构记录了沉重的人权代价：世居当地的胡维塔特（Huwaitat）部落遭到暴力强拆，多名拒绝搬迁的村民被枪杀、判处极刑或面临长达数十年监禁。在环保方面，虽然该项目对外标榜纯可再生能源与可持续性，但国际能源署（IEA）数据显示沙特电网可再生能源占比仅为0.1%；法国SKEMA商学院研究更表明，建造The Line将排放约1.8吉吨二氧化碳，其巨大的前期建材与施工碳足迹彻底抵消了智能技术未来可能节省的全部减排量。食利国家转型阵痛与税债重压 (27:28) “2030愿景”设立的初衷是摆脱沙特对石油经济的畸形依赖（油气占其出口总额的84%、GDP的42%）。在典型的食利国家体系下，全国三分之二的就业国民在公共部门任职，薪酬高出私营部门一倍，但2016年沙特公务员大臣曾承认公职人员日均实际工作时长仅约一小时。为支撑以Neom为代表的巨额资本开支，沙特不仅大举发债并减持沙特阿美（Aramco）股权，还在2020年将增值税税率从5%大幅提高至15%，被当地人戏称为“Neom税”，直接加重了国内民众的经济负担。 The Line由170公里骤缩至2.4公里的现实，印证了建筑顾问Peter Cook对其500米超高直线设计的荒谬性判断；这一项目从雄心勃勃的科技乌托邦沦为不断收缩的沙漠奇观，折射出专制资本在脱离客观工程逻辑与经济规律时所遭遇的必然瓶颈。

Source quotes

[29:28] SKEMA Business School researchers: while smart cities promise zero carbon thanks to new technologies, their construction, operation, and supply requirements are so environmentally costly that it outweighs any carbon reduction that might be attained in the future. [13:46] Ali Shahabi: I think you have to go beyond the glitz and the futuristic videos and the hyperbolic language that comes from Western consultants, and I think what Neom has failed to explain properly is that there is substance below this.

Original transcript

[0:00] neom the line is a 170 km long City being built in the deserts of Saudi Arabia That was supposed [0:08] to cost $200 billion to build it'll accommodate 9 million people in a massive structure that is 200 [0:16] M wide and 500 M tall it's conveniently located in an allegedly empty area of desert the line [0:25] has been pitched as a smart City complete with extreme technology including all of the modern [0:32] features that you would want like an artificial Moon robot dinosaurs flying cars human gene [0:39] editing and glowi inthe dark sand amongst many other attractions according to a Wall Street [0:45] Journal article about the project this corner of Saudi Arabia is so Barren that the only abundant [0:52] resources that a group of Consultants could identify were sunlight and unlimited access to [1:00] salt water now let's not be negative about this location is not the only consideration in a real [1:07] estate project I'm reliably told location is only one of the three important factors there are at [1:14] least two other important factors that need to be considered now I won't lie I'm a bit nervous about [1:20] making this video and I hope that nothing I say is viewed as criticism I'm really just telling you [1:26] the news about the scaling back of this obvious viously great project you might be aware that [1:32] things didn't work out very well for the last guy who questioned the wisdom of building a 170 km [1:39] long 200 M wide City in a previously overlooked prime location new project this futuristic [1:47] city that he he is planning to invest half a trillion dollar in it what if it goes wrong it [1:53] could bankrupt the country but no one's allowed to criticize it no one allowed to write an objective [2:01] a piece in any newspaper I might have to lie low for a while after this video is released [2:07] and obviously I won't be accepting any Embassy invitations no matter how many frero rochet [2:13] I'm offered the ambassador's receptions are noted in society for their hosts Exquisite [2:19] [Music] taste you're really spoiling now I know that I've mentioned this project in Prior videos [2:32] and I hope that nothing from those videos will be misinterpreted as criticism and if the Saudi [2:39] Arabian Sovereign wealth fund hadn't blown the money on soft bank they would have blown [2:44] it on credit s or neom the 110 mile long City that they're building which guarantees that inhabitants [2:52] are always the maximum distance from wherever they need to go at any point in time oh okay yeah so [2:59] that could sound like criticism but I'm not even sure if that was even me it might have been made [3:04] using AI I don't really even cover topics like that on this channel my videos as regular viewers [3:12] know are mostly about rap and rapping uh with my goal being to be the number one Crypt nerd [3:18] gangster rap Channel on YouTube but sometimes I do get distracted by other topics but anyhow [3:26] Bloomberg reported this week that Saudi Arabia is is scaling back its medium-term Ambitions [3:32] for neon the line they say that the pullback comes as the kingdom Sovereign wealth fund has [3:39] yet to approve Nom's 2024 budget and that the financial realities of the trillions of dollars [3:46] of investment are starting to cause concern at the highest levels of the Saudi government as it [3:52] tries to fulfill its ambitious Vision 2030 program to diversify the Kingdom's economy [3:59] away from fossil fuels Bloomberg reports that the Saudi Sovereign wealth funds cash reserves have [4:07] fallen to $5 billion as of September the lowest level since 2020 the line City according to the [4:15] latest reports is now only expected to extend 2.4 kilm and house 300,000 people by the end of [4:24] the decade this is a 98.6% reduction from the initial plans so it's still going ahead it'll [4:33] just be a little bit smaller than had been hoped for while building an unusually densely populated [4:40] 170 kilometer long City that's as tall as some of the tallest buildings in the world in what [4:47] is described as a harsh dry desert with great temperature extremes strikes me as a great idea [4:54] other people have not been as positive about these plans we'll discuss some of their criticisms in [5:00] today's video but before we get to that let me tell you about today's video sponsor delete me [5:07] delete me is a subscription service that deletes your personal information that's being sold online [5:13] data Brokers are businesses that collect huge amounts of personally identifiable information [5:19] on individuals and package it all together to create profiles or listings with your personal [5:26] data these profiles can include things like social Social Security numbers birthdays past and recent [5:33] addresses information about your relatives and much more this sort of information can be [5:39] useful to scammers stalkers and for identity theft you do have the right to protect your [5:45] privacy by requesting that data Brokers delete any information they store on you but unfortunately [5:52] there are hundreds of data Brokers and they make it incredibly tedious to get off their lists it [5:58] could take forever to get this done manually I use delete me to reach out to the hundreds of [6:04] data Brokers on my behalf to request a deletion of my personal data and to deal with any objections [6:11] they might have with a yearly subscription delete me regularly tracks these Brokers to make sure [6:18] that they don't read your data to their lists get 20% off delete me Us customer plans when you go to [6:27] join delet me.com boil and use promo code boil at checkout for international plans including the UK [6:37] go to international. jooin delet me.com in 2017 King Salmon reshuffled Saudi Arabia's succession [6:46] order replacing his nephew who had been the first in line to the throne with his son Prince Muhammed [6:54] who's known as MBS which long-term viewers of this channel will know stands for more mortgage back [7:00] Securities but which also stands for Muhammad bin salmon so it'll be one of those four months after [7:08] his appointment MBS unveiled his plans for neom the word neom is an amalgamation of the ancient [7:16] Greek word for new and the Arabic word for future the project is being overseen and financed by [7:23] the Saudi Arabian Sovereign wealth fund which the Crown Prince also chaires it was pitched [7:29] is costing $200 billion but upon reflection might cost a bit more than that last month [7:37] a construction update was released on the neom YouTube channel one of the most ambitious projects [7:44] the world has ever seen is progressing rapidly the first phase of the line will be complete by 2030 [7:51] we are committed representing the world's biggest earthw Works operation work continues Around the [7:57] Clock millions of cubic meters of earth and water are being moved per week we've done a lot of the [8:04] foundation work literally and figuratively we are ready to go some people would say that a lot of [8:10] that construction work looked like CGI but not me it looked very realistic to me and the man in the [8:16] video said that a lot of the foundation work has been done literally and figuratively and there's [8:23] no reason to believe that he would mislead us it's definitely been done both literally and fig [8:29] eratively it's good to hear that a lot of work has been done as people are scheduled to move [8:35] in any day now so back to your question when will people go there and live I would say early 24 we [8:44] will have accommodations built for good number and uh Hospitality Hotel so we can attract uh tourists [8:54] and of course airport so we can have our airpoort where people can live of this uh first quarter of [9:02] 24 will be the first Milestone we want to meet now look a lot of people have commented on the [9:08] shape of the city which is quite unusual off the top of my head I can't think of any other cities [9:15] that are 170 km long while only 200 M wide and 500 M tall in fact I struggle to think of any cities [9:24] that are taller than they are wide historically skyscrapers have been built in very dense Urban [9:31] locations where the price of land is so high that it makes economic sense to build upwards [9:37] to minimize the cost of the land per total floor area of a building but you can also build them in [9:44] an area so Barren that the only abundant natural resources are sunlight and unlimited access to [9:51] saltwater as who are we to criticize the Judgment of a Crown Prince who is likely appointed by God [10:00] there are experts in urban planning or Heretics as I like to call them who study the shape of [10:06] cities I found a paper by Brinkley and Raj which explains that in open systems perfusion guides [10:14] form and growth they explain that ecosystems grow as fractals with new branches sprouting in order [10:22] to maximize profusion and resource uptake they go on to explain that most cities grow as fractals [10:30] branching out maximizing the urban interface with available Fuel and arable land they argue [10:38] that cities are like cells suspended in a growth medium the growth medium being arable land and the [10:44] urban fabric grows to maximize profusion now all of these points make sense if you're building a [10:51] city somewhere near things like water arable land or any other resources necessary for human life [10:59] but it's my considered judgment that when building in an unhospitable environment like a desert or [11:06] the surface of a distant planet the longer and taller a city is the better so while most cities [11:13] are circular because they grow to interact with food water trade and commerce MBS came up with a [11:21] long narrow and very tall City in an unhospitable part of the world and that's probably also a very [11:28] good idea in fact it definitely is if you think about it if the first building is in a [11:36] questionable location it makes sense for the one next to it to be a bit away from that location [11:42] and the city would then naturally form a line as it tries to get away from itself now the argument [11:49] has been made by possibly someone impersonating me using AI that a long narrow City guarantees that [11:57] inhabitants are always the mic maximum distance from wherever they need to go but the designers [12:03] of the line do have a solution for that problem the line's infrastructure makes it possible to [12:09] travel end to end in 20 minutes with no need for cars resulting in zero carbon emissions now this [12:17] train system is very impressive to travel 170 km in 20 minutes you'd have to be traveling at 510 [12:26] kmph which is a bit faster than and the world's fastest train of course 510 kmph assumes no stops [12:36] along the way which might be a bit inconvenient for people who live near the middle of the city [12:42] London Underground stations and New York subway stations are usually about a quar of a mile [12:48] apart from each other 170 km is 105.6 MI so the line would need 412 train stops along the way [12:59] subway trains usually stop and open their doors for at least 30 seconds at each station so with [13:06] 42 stations the train would be stopped for 206 minutes allowing people to get on and off the [13:13] train at the stations 206 minutes is of course a bit more than 20 minutes so people would need [13:21] to get on and off the trains a bit quicker than that if the train stopped for Just 2 seconds at [13:27] each station the train would only be stopped for 14 minutes leaving us with 6 minutes to travel [13:34] 170 km so we would just have to travel at 1,700 km hour which is a bit over 1,000 mph 1,000 mph would [13:46] of course be an average speed there would have to be a lot of extreme acceleration and deceleration [13:52] going on meaning that the top speed would have to be well over 1,000 mph you'd have 2 seconds to get [14:00] on or off a train that would quickly accelerate up to let's say three times the speed of sound [14:06] before slamming on its brakes for the next station and when you lose blood pressure to your head you [14:12] could even lose Consciousness and we turn that g-induced loss of consciousness or g-lock I won't [14:19] lie to you it sounds a little bit stressful to me you'd have to get your seat belt on rather quickly [14:30] now what could possibly go that fast oh yeah of course Elon musk's hyperloop in 2020 it was [14:38] announced that hyperloop 1 had partnered with neom it's like a tube with an air hockey table [14:45] I swear it's not that hard oh but hold on it was just announced a few months ago that hyperloop [14:52] one is actually shutting down that's probably what's holding things up at neon I'm sure though [14:59] that someone else could build one it can't be that hard it's like a tube with an air hockey [15:04] table I swear it's not that hard in truth it doesn't really matter to me I'd probably get [15:11] about in one of those autonomous flying cars that they show in the video that's [15:16] basically how I get around anyhow the rest of you should probably just walk [15:22] residents have access to all their daily needs within 5 minute walk neighborhoods [15:27] most people will want to walk anyhow rather than risk getting stuck in the door of the [15:32] hyperloop Ali shahabi one of the Project's advisors explained to the Ft that westerners [15:42] don't necessarily get the project look I think you have to go beyond the glitz and the futuristic [15:50] videos and the hyperbolic language that comes from Western consultants and I think what neom [15:57] has failed to explain properly is that there is substance below this when asked if he would [16:04] like to live at neam he replied I'm too old to live in the line I think the line is going to [16:09] attract uh Saudis in their 20s and 30s I have to agree with Ali there getting on and off the [16:16] hyperloop within that two second window is a young man's game you have to be in the prime [16:22] of life to be able to handle the G forces as it accelerates to Mach 3 and then slows to a [16:27] full halt for 412 times in a single 20-minute Journey it's not really for me either the line [16:35] is going to be a fairly busy City 9 million people will be living on a footprint of just [16:41] 34 Square kilomet which is 13 square miles Manila in the Philippines has the world's [16:49] highest population density with 119 19,600 people per square mile neom would have 686,000 [16:59] people per square mile which is almost six times the population density of Manila I feel there [17:05] would be a real sense of community there the line is expected to be quite a place in 2019 The Wall [17:13] Street Journal reviewed 2300 pages of documents put together by Consultants at BCG McKenzie and [17:21] Oliver Wyman the Consultants were directed by MBS to help turn his idea into a reality [17:28] and the documents highlight that the project is so ambitious that it incorporates many technologies [17:35] that don't yet exist there will be flying taxis cloud seeding to make it rain in the [17:41] desert robot Maids which didn't exist at the time but were since invented by Elon Musk scientists [17:50] at neom will work on a project to modify the human genome to make people stronger which is surprising [17:59] there will be a robotic dinosaur park which is probably safer than an actual dinosaur park [18:06] robotic cage fighting yeah there's there's going to be a lot of robots and hopefully [18:12] they won't start fights with the the maid a giant artificial moon will light up each night and live [18:20] stream images from outer space acting as an iconic Landmark but that's not all apparently the Crown [18:29] Prince wants a beach that glows in the dark like the face of a watch who knows maybe the radiation [18:37] from this glowing sand can also modify the human genome and that would kill two birds with the one [18:44] stone I suppose additionally cameras drones and facial recognition technology will track everyone [18:52] at all times uh which sounds nice uh these cameras could possibly be useful for keeping track of the [19:00] people who unlike me are critical of the project if I moved there I wouldn't even have to make [19:07] these videos I could just be live streaming all the time the Wall Street Journal piece [19:13] says that Nom's Reliance on foreign Consultants reveals a sensitive challenge for the country as [19:20] Saudi Arabia historically lacked expertise in planning engineering and management I'll tell [19:27] you there's no sign of of a lack of those skills in this project plan to me the rest of the world [19:34] appears to be lagging behind I can't think of the last time I've watched a robot fighting on [19:39] a beach where the sand is glowing like the face of a watch neom Aimes to have zero work or stress [19:47] related diseases according to the documents with residents all working at startups while [19:54] neom is in the middle of the desert it will have numerous Farm markets I'm not sure how far the [20:01] farmers will have to travel or if they'll come and go by hyperloop I'd worry a little bit about [20:07] growing vegetables in the glow-in-the-dark sand which otherwise sounds lovely the pl detail how [20:15] the city will have schools with classes taught by holographic teachers which sounds like a bit of a [20:22] disappointment when you have all of these robots kicking around but okay look the there's just [20:28] going to be a lot of tech at Neom intelligent solutions create efficiency and year round [20:35] temperate microclimate with natural ventilation energy and Water Supplies are 100% renewable it's [20:44] good that they've worked out the ventilation and water thing as this is in the middle of [20:49] the desert and Saudi Arabia interestingly enough has no permanent rivers or lakes and [20:55] has very little rainfall Neom water needs will be provided by desalination plans Neom will include [21:04] an eight-sided buoyant City that will float on the Red Sea it'll have its own Judiciary System [21:11] entirely automated using AI the line even has unveiled its own metaverse platform where you and [21:20] those around you enter a new reality transporting you to Mars one day and magical worlds the next [21:29] where your retail experience is completely reimagined there will be a digital asset [21:35] Marketplace for crypto and nft trading and a mixed reality social media experience it it sounds great [21:44] right the Consultants allegedly worked on all of these ideas along with a plan for how local [21:51] tribes would be forcibly relocated according to the guardian Saudi authorities are accused [21:58] of illegally displacing tribes people in the region often without adequate compensation and [22:05] a violently cracking down on those who peacefully oppose or resist eviction they report that in [22:13] 2020 a tribesmen was shot dead after refusing to give up his land for the project and the three [22:20] tribesmen who live in the region today face execution after reportedly being arrested for [22:27] resisting eviction another three were sentenced to between 27 and 50 years in prison it's Virgin [22:34] Territory uh it's a beautiful Coast there are some government buildings that have been built [22:39] according to the Saudi tourism board while tourism in Saudi Arabia was a pipe dream only a few years [22:46] ago ambitious projects like Neom and the line will draw huge crowds to the country I know that when I [22:55] think of a good place to go on holiday I always search for the most authoritarian Theocratic [23:00] dictatorship in the world especially when they've built a new city with cameras drones and facial [23:06] recognition technology to allow intelligent services to track everyone at all times to [23:13] keep them safe and I'm sure that you feel the same look the best reason for building the line which [23:21] should definitely be built in full is not just that it's a great idea but it's a really good [23:27] deal and MBS negotiated a bargain price on this project the line is going to be 500 M tall which [23:36] is about the same height as Taipei 101 which was the tallest building in the world when it [23:41] was built 20 years ago at a cost of just under $2 billion Taipei 101 is 75 M wide so you would need [23:51] to build 13.3 of these for each kilometer 2,270 of these buildings would equal just one wall of the [24:00] line for both City walls you would need 4,540 type 101s and that's just the external walls there's [24:10] still all the inner buildings the hyperloop the floating gardens the autonomous flying pods and [24:17] the artificial Moon let's not forget power plants water desalination plants airport sewage treatment [24:25] human gene editing facilities and everything else needed for a modern city the line will have about [24:33] half of the population of New York City and thus should require around 5,000 megawatts of power per [24:39] day it might need a lot more than that as water desalination is very energy intensive and being [24:46] based in the desert people might want to run their air conditioners most of the time according to the [24:53] New York Times New York City requires hundreds of power plants to run but gets around onethird [25:00] of its power from four nuclear power plants let's say the line is a very energy efficient City and [25:07] can get by on one third of the power consumed by New York City you would then need to build [25:14] four or five nuclear power plants to supply that power Sinapse energy estimates that each [25:21] power plant would cost between $6 and9 billion so we're looking at$ 30 to $40 billion just for [25:28] the power plants to supply electricity now I'm not saying that they'll use nuclear power to generate [25:34] electricity for neon the plans just say that the source of power will have zero carbon impact and [25:41] it appears that they're looking at a mix of energy sources obviously different sources of power have [25:48] different costs but bringing enough electricity online to power city of 9 million people in a [25:54] desert will be expensive the 4,500 140 Taipei 101 buildings needed just as the exterior walls for [26:03] the line would cost 9.1 trillion dollars assuming that construction costs have not gone up in 20 [26:11] years which they probably have MBS was initially going to build all of this for $200 billion Which [26:19] is less than 2% of the cost I've estimated for just the walls this is an amazing deal and no [26:27] wonder everyone is excited about it especially when the power plants alone could cost 1 of that [26:34] they've since upped the cost estimate to $500 billion you know the way uh Builder estimates [26:41] can be but it's still quite a deal thunderf00t estimated the overall build cost of a city like [26:48] this to be $ hundred trillion in a video that he made last year which was more negative than [26:55] this one he's not an optimist like I am well look down another way we took the entire GDP of Saudi [27:01] Arabia for about the next say for instance 100 years you might just be able to fund this I think [27:08] that thunderf00t is of course forgetting the huge increase in GDP that will come as Saudi Arabia [27:15] transitions away from oil and gas and moves to all of these startups that the people will be working [27:22] at he's forgetting the sales of carbon neutral autonomous flying cars that they clearly show in [27:28] their video tourism where they're projecting that they'll attract more tourists per year than Paris [27:35] by 20130 there's the nft trading the Hologram teachers with neom Saudi Arabia's GDP I think [27:43] can definitely be expected to grow significantly the British architect Peter Cook who's working [27:51] on the project was asked about its feasibility last year he said you know I think that they'll [27:58] get a bit of it done he went on to describe the proposed 500 M height as a bit stupid saying that [28:05] all of our engineer friends will tell you this I'd like to be clear that I in no way agree with [28:12] Peter I think that the whole thing is a great idea and believe that the extreme height of the city is [28:19] as necessary to the project as the fighting robots and the sand that glows like the face [28:25] of a watch these are all features of a mod modern sustainable development that people want neom is [28:32] without a doubt the future of urban planning Saudi Arabia's economy is today mostly driven by oil and [28:40] gas which account for 84% of exports and 42% of GDP Saudi Arabians don't generally work in service [28:50] jobs or do physical labor they import foreigners to do that type of work the country is often [28:57] described as a neopatrimonial rentier state as due to the oil wealth 66% of Saudi Arabians work for [29:06] the government and Saudi men working in the public sector in contrast to the rest of the world earn [29:13] about twice as much as they would earn in the private sector according to the Civil Service [29:19] minister in 2016 many Saudi government employees really only work one hour per day under Muhammad [29:28] in salon's Vision 2030 project Saudi Arabia is aiming to diversify its economy away from fossil [29:35] fuels and become a global hub for technology and Innovation Vision 2030 is not just Mega projects [29:44] like the line it calls for more women in the workforce more investment a focus on tourism [29:51] and better education to build a knowledge-based economy according to Business Insider Saudi [29:58] Arabia's Mega projects have grown so expensive that its oil wealth can no longer cover the cost [30:05] the country they say has resorted to borrowing and selling shares in the state oil company just [30:11] to fund these projects in 2020 Saudi Arabia tripled vat from 5% to 15% which some Saudis [30:21] refer to as the neom tax critics of this project accus the developers of neom of greenwashing or [30:29] making Grand promises about the environment that are not reflected in reality MBS has announced [30:36] that 50% of Saudi Arabia's electricity will be produced by renewable energy by 2030 with 6 years [30:45] left to go iea figures show that only 0.1% of this has been achieved researchers at schema business [30:54] school argue that construction of the line would generate about 1.8 gatons of CO2 they say that [31:03] while smart cities promise zero carbon thanks to new technologies their construction operation and [31:10] Supply requirements are so environmentally costly that it outweighs any carbon reduction that might [31:17] be attained in the future according to the researchers most of the green claims being [31:23] made by neom rely on technologies that do not yet exist to highlight these contradictions neom has [31:31] been selected as the host of the 2029 Asian Winter Games which required the construction [31:38] of a ski slope in the desert neom is not Saudi Arabia's first attempt at building new cities in [31:46] the desert to diversify their economy away from oil in 2005 a $30 billion project was announced [31:54] to build six cities which were supposed to attract foreign investment create more than a million jobs [32:01] and add $150 billion to GDP only one of the six cities was ever completed King Abdullah economic [32:10] city which today has a population of just 10,000 people compared to its Target of 2 million people [32:19] cynic will tell you that the only reason that it was even completed was because it carried [32:24] the then king's name I worry that this video has drifted in a somewhat negative Direction [32:31] but all of that negativity is coming from other people not me I think neom is a great idea if you [32:39] enjoyed today's video you should watch this one next don't forget to check out our sponsor delete [32:45] me using the link in the video description talk to you in the next video bye [Music]