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World Energy Outlook 2025
The IEA’s flagship World Energy Outlook (WEO) is the most authoritative source of global energy analysis and projections. Updated annually to reflect the latest energy data, technology and market trends, and government policies, it explores a range of possible energy futures and their implications for energy security, access and emissions. The WEO covers the whole energy system, using a scenario-based approach to highlight the central choices, consequences and contingencies that lie ahead. It includes exploratory scenarios that flow from different assumptions about existing policies, as well as normative pathways that achieve energy and emissions goals in full. The multi…
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Key Questions on Energy and AI
Following the publication of the IEA’s landmark Energy and AI report in 2025, this report examines how the energy and AI nexus has evolved amid surging investment in data centres and rapid advances in model capabilities. Drawing on fresh datasets and analysis, it explores where electricity demand is rising, how quickly grids and supply chains can respond, and what these shifts mean for energy security, affordability and sustainability.
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Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) is emerging as one of the most consequential technologies of our time. In recent years, the capabilities of AI systems have grown quickly due to improved computing power, a boom in data availability and breakthroughs in the design of AI models, leading to rapid adoption by both businesses and individuals. Though significant uncertainties remain, AI has the potential to transform the energy sector in the coming decade. It is set to drive a surge in electricity demand from data centres around the world while also unlocking significant opportunities to cut costs, enhance competitiveness and reduce emissions.To…
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Energy and AI Understanding the energy-AI nexus
Artificial intelligence (AI) has a long history, dating back to at least the 1950s. Over time, it has seen a series of alternating periods of optimism and pessimism (so-called “AI winters”). In recent years, however, AI has been dramatically boosted by several developments and breakthroughs in techniques, costs and technology that have led to the rise of AI in its modern form that we are familiar with today, in particular generative AI. These developments include the massive increase in computing power and decline in cost due to exponential improvements in computing hardware performance; the exponential increase in the availability…
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Energy and AI Energy demand from AI
What is a data centre? Artificial intelligence (AI) model training and deployment occur mainly in data centres. Understanding the role of data centres as actors in the energy system first requires an understanding of their component parts. Data centres are facilities used to house servers, storage systems, networking equipment and associated components that are installed in racks and organised into rows. This IT equipment, and a range of auxiliary equipment required to keep it in working order, comprise the following:Servers are computers that process and store data. They can be equipped with central processing units (CPUs) and specialised accelerators…
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Energy and AI Executive summary
The transformative potential of AI depends on energy There has been a step change in the capabilities of artificial intelligence (AI), driven by falling computation costs, a surge in data availability and technical breakthroughs. AI is the science of making machines capable of learning to perform tasks that traditionally required human intelligence. AI is emerging as a general-purpose technology, much like electricity. Today, it can generate text and videos, accelerate scientific discovery in fields like medicine or materials science, make manufacturing robots smarter and more productive, drive commercial taxis in complex city landscapes, and detect threats to critical infrastructure…
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Rare Earth Elements Executive summary
Rare earth elements have rapidly moved to the forefront of the energy and economic policy agenda Rare earth elements play a crucial role in a wide range of strategic applications, from energy, transport and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to aerospace, medical and defence systems. The wide range of applications, combined with highly concentrated supply chains, has elevated their importance in both energy and broader economic security discussions. Though relatively plentiful in the Earth’s crust, this set of 17 elements have garnered the label “rare” because economically viable concentrations are uncommon and they are seldom found in pure form. Their chemical…
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Key Questions on Energy and AI Executive summary
…75% in 2026. Capital expenditure of just five technology companies is now larger than global investment in oil and natural gas production. Many jurisdictions are seeing project pipelines accelerate dramatically, although not all projects will come to fruition. Those that are moving forward are doing so at pace: the IEA’s unique satellite-based tracking shows that “artificial intelligence (AI) factories” – cutting-edge data centres specifically designed for AI – have more than tripled in capacity in the past 18 months. Meanwhile, the capabilities of AI are improving quickly, increasing the likelihood that it will reshape economic growth, innovation and competitiveness and…
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Energy and AI AI for energy optimisation and innovation
AI can help optimise complex energy systems The energy system is complex and evolving. It is becoming increasingly electrified, digitalised, connected and decentralised, with mounting cost pressures. These drivers have encouraged energy companies to deploy applications that utilise artificial intelligence to optimise systems, improve production, reduce costs, raise efficiency, improve uptime, cut emissions and enhance safety. Many of the desired goals of AI’s application in the energy sector – such as cost reductions, enhanced reliability and improved resilience – are challenging to quantify at a broader sectoral level, beyond the confines of individual case studies. It is also challenging to predict…
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Global Energy and Climate Model Stated Policies Scenario (STEPS)
…inform the important decisions that are being taken today.The methodology for the STEPS has been consistent over time, but the modelling approaches have evolved across successive iterations of the scenario. Among other things, there has been a concerted effort to develop insights into energy supply chains, including those for critical minerals. Work on electricity has been underpinned by granular hourly modelling of the operation of power systems, and by detailed consideration of new sources of demand such as data centres and artificial intelligence (AI). New geospatial analysis is now a regular feature of IEA modelling and analyses. Related links
