World Energy Outlook 2025
☑️ The World Energy Outlook 2025 (WEO-2025) of International Energy Agency considers the following scenarios:
📌 Current Policies Scenario (CPS): A snapshot of policies and regulations that are already in place.
📌 Stated Policies Scenario (STEPS): Encompasses a broader range of policies, including those that have been formally proposed but not yet adopted, as well as other official strategy documents that indicate the intended direction of policy.
📌 Net Zero Emissions by 2050 Scenario (NZE Scenario): Describes a pathway to reduce global energy-related CO₂ emissions to net zero by 2050, while recognising that each country will follow its own route.
☑️ Key Takeaways
📌 Electricity
- Electricity demand grows much faster than overall energy use in all scenarios: it rises by around 40% to 2035 in both the CPS and the STEPS, and by more than 50% in the NZE Scenario.
- Electricity currently accounts for only 21% of total final energy consumption globally, yet it is the key energy source for sectors representing over 40% of the global economy, and the main energy source for most households.
- A pivotal issue for electricity security is the pace at which new grids, storage facilities, and other sources of power system flexibility are developed.
- Investments in electricity generation have surged by almost 70% since 2015, reaching USD 1 trillion per year, while annual grid spending has increased at less than half that pace to around USD 400 billion.
- The explosive growth in electricity demand for data centres and AI is concentrated in advanced economies and China. Investment in data centres is expected to reach USD 580 billion in 2025. A tripling of electricity consumption by data centres by 2035 will represent less than 10% of total global electricity demand growth, but it will be highly concentrated geographically. More than 85% of new data centre capacity additions over the next ten years are expected in the United States, China, and the European Union.
📌 Renewables
- Renewables grow faster than any other major energy source in all scenarios, led by solar photovoltaics.
📌 Nuclear Power
- Another common element across scenarios is the revival of nuclear energy, with investment rising in both traditional large-scale plants and new designs, including small modular reactors (SMRs).
- More than 40 countries now include nuclear energy in their strategies and are taking steps to develop new projects.
➡️ Source: International Energy Agency. World Energy Outlook 2025
