The middle east has done pretty well for themselves fiscally speaking, it is still not very politically stable, but they have a lot of money now from significant energy generation.

If we could place a huge solar farm in the Sahara and find a way to transport this energy worldwide, I think it would be great for them. They wouldn't have to transport directly, they could create some sort of fuel that could easily be transported all over the world.

There are hundreds of ways forward to a sustainable future and the technology already exists, and the political landscape is getting better every day. People aren't just going to give up, they are going to keep complaining until something is done. The majority of the world seems to know what is going on and they are upset about it. They aren't going to calm done until we are on the right path.

Aluminium is nicknamed "Solid Electricity" because from a cost point of view, it is almost entirely electricity, and is very transportable.

If carbon prices became very high, Iron/Steel would be the same (although with high carbon prices, aluminium would replace many uses of steel).

At least it's not too easy to transport electric energy long distances. Maybe this will mitigate the exploitation you are fearing.

HVDC (high voltage direct current) networks can actually move electricity on an order of hundreds of miles with single digit % losses. There are further losses though during the switch from solar DC to AC, where voltage is then stepped up, and again back to DC for the transmission.