Rapid expansion of renewables has thus far mostly covered fast-growing energy demand rather than displacing fossil fuels. New demand drivers such as data centres and cooling could reverse declining demand trends from 2024–2025 without further effort.
Key advances
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Record expansion in solar power in the first three-quarters of 2025 was sufficient to raise total clean electricity generation faster than demand growth for the first time.
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New loads such as artificial intelligence data centres and increasing cooling needs accelerate increasing energy demand, potentially reversing regional power demand reduction trends in 2024–2025.
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Achieving a genuine and sustained global-scale energy transition — where renewables structurally displace fossil energy — requires greater emphasis on reducing energy demand while increasing well-being.
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Without further demand-side efforts, projected additional power demand between 2025 and 2030 is expected to consume the projected rapid renewable energy expansion.
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Acknowledgements
The authors acknowledge the support of The Energy Demand changes Induced by Technological and Social Innovations (EDITS) project, which is coordinated by the Research Institute of Innovative Technology for the Earth (RITE) and funded by the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry (METI), Japan.
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Ürge-Vorsatz, D., Creutzig, F. Energy demand and decarbonization in 2025 and beyond. Nat. Rev. Clean Technol. 2, 4–5 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44359-025-00139-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s44359-025-00139-w
