Due to the adverse effect of energy production from traditional fossil fuels, the move toward renewable and sustainable energy has become imperative. The waste disposal sector offers hope toward environmental sustainability and potential to generate strong income for any economy. The region of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member countries in the Middle East generates the highest quantity of municipal waste per capita, compared to other countries globally. In the GCC region, waste is usually just dumped at different landfill stations. Effective waste management is imperative for environmental protection and sustainable development. This article presents a review of the sustainable waste management strategies in Oman, in line with the United Nations goal on environmental management of waste. The current waste management strategies in Oman were discussed, and various waste-to-energy (WTE) technologies were proposed. These proposed WTE strategies would help in effective waste management in Oman and also in increasing the power grid capability. The salient part of this article is an overview of the ability of using landfill leachate as feedstock to produce clean and green hydrogen gas using different photo-fermentation processes. The production of hydrogen using single photo-fermentation process using landfill leachate alone, with leachate and addition of inoculum such as sewage sludge, and with substrates such as sucrose, glucose, and landfill leachate was investigated by utilizing a batch bioreactor and anaerobic conditions at controlled temperature, different initial pH, and heat treatment temperature range. Furthermore, a prototype model for the optimization of the inoculum size and the substrate was proposed with 2-level factorial design using Design Expert. The data gathering for this study was carried out by investigating different regions in Oman having the lowest and highest waste produce, the average annual waste for the different governorates, and the total amount of waste for five consecutive years (2015–2020), for the various engineered landfills. The cost of managing waste in the different governorates of Oman was presented, considering the average annual waste produced, in various regions of the country for the duration of the study. Furthermore, some challenges and opportunities in carrying out effective waste management in Oman were addressed.

The recent fall in oil prices made oil and gas companies to rethink their production strategies and optimize their expenses, while at same time, optimally extract oil in a cost-effective way. A combination of rising oil demand and declining supply from the conventional sources is drawing global attention to the vast heavy-oil resources. Heavy oil has high viscosity and is commonly developed with steam-based processes which, in most cases, burn fossil fuel to generate the required steam. However, tightening constraints on fuel, water, and the environment are some of the factors currently fuelling the interests to enhance the traditional steaming operations. Generating steam using solar energy has overcome the challenges of steam been produced from burning of natural gas. The most common challenge is that steam production using natural gas burnt facilities are expensive and the cost of natural gas required to generate steam is considerably high. The use of renewable energy system is the best alternative to achieve reduction of the high cost of energy supply and carbon emission. Due to the heavy nature of the oil explored from Oman, the cost of drilling is quite high and also involves a lot of fossil energy to heat up the heavy oil to reduce its viscosity, reduce the pressure of the system, ease the flow and make it light before drilling. A new technology know as the Enhanced Oil Recovery is been proposed using solar energy instead of the conventional fossil energy, in order to save cost and the same time, make the environment eco-friendly. This paper presents prospects of solar farm steam generator-based technology, in the southern part of Oman, where the requirement of steam for oil exploration is high. The Amal and Amin oil fields were used as case studies. The solar steam generator model was analyzed considering some of the technical designs in the enhanced oil recovery process, compared to traditional schemes used for oil extraction. With installation of solar based steam generators, gas consumption for steam generation and environmental pollution would be reduced substantially. Also, some of the benefits and challenges of the concentrating solar power steam technology employed were highlighted. Moreover, the opportunities the solar farm could offer to the Sultanate in general were discussed.