The 2025 edition of the World Energy Outlook (WEO) reintroduces the Current Policies Scenario (CPS). It was a regular feature of the International Energy Agency suite of scenarios until the WEO-2020, when it was discontinued amid turmoil in energy markets and rapid changes in the policy landscape during the Covid-19 pandemic. Now that the world has passed through the pandemic and the global energy crisis triggered at the outset of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, there is merit in revisiting the CPS. The scenario relies only on measures that are formally written into existing legislation and regulation, and which does not consider any additional changes to policy, even where governments have announced an intention to enact them.

The CPS is not a forecast or a prediction of the way the energy system will unfold. Nor should it be interpreted as a “business-as-usual” scenario. There are several parts of the energy system today where innovative technologies are already being deployed at scale, underpinned by robust economics and mature, existing policy frameworks. In these areas, business-as-usual would imply continuing the current process of change. However, in the CPS, we assume that potential constraints, whether due to insufficient infrastructure, a lack of institutional capacity or financing, or the absence of continued policy support, slow the uptake of these new technologies.

The CPS sees higher levels of total energy demand and carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions than our other scenarios. This should not be taken as a sign that more energy needs are met in the CPS than in the other scenarios. Slightly higher prices curtail energy service demands in some cases, for example, reducing the distances projected to be travelled by car, while the slowdown in efficiency measures means that more energy is used in the CPS to deliver the same level of energy service compared to other scenarios, for example for space cooling.