00:00El progreso globalmente no está en ese nivel que el gobierno ha enviado o enviado para
00:07themselves en este momento, y creo que hay una oportunidad de acelerar el progreso en muchos casos.
00:19Hola y un muy buen saludo a Energy Frontiers, soy Rebeca McLaughlin-Easton.
00:25Today, we're focusing on energy efficiency, a key tool in addressing energy affordability,
00:31quality of life and industrial competitiveness. Efficiency actions over the past 20 years
00:37have reduced household energy bills, greenhouse gas emissions and reliance on fossil fuel imports
00:44in some countries, but significant challenges to that progress lie ahead. The International
00:50Energy Agency joins me from Paris to discuss them. But first, here's an overview of the
00:55IEA's Energy Efficiency Report for 2025. Global energy efficiency progress is set
01:01to improve by 1.8% in 2025, up from around 1% last year, according to the IEA. Despite the uptick,
01:10the world remains off track to meet the COP28 goal of doubling annual energy efficiency gains
01:16by 2030. Some nations, mainly emerging economies, are showing stronger gains than in previous years,
01:22with energy intensity progress estimated to be more than 3% in China and more than 4% in India.
01:30More mature markets are weaker, with the United States and EU projected to fall below 1%
01:36after several years of stronger performance following the energy crisis.
01:40Some key trends holding back faster progress include industry, responsible for around two-thirds of
01:47global energy demand growth since 2019. Policy lagging technology progress is another,
01:53as is electricity demand growth outpacing renewable supply. Global energy efficiency-related
02:01investment is set to reach almost $800 billion in 2025, up 6% year-on-year. And despite 18 million people
02:10employed in energy efficiency last year, higher costs and labour shortages remain pain points.
02:18Lucas, it's great to see you. Thank you so much for joining me from Paris today.
02:22Thank you very much for having me. And thank you for taking the time to talk about energy efficiency.
02:25Let me start by asking you about your latest report, which points to energy efficiency having risen by
02:30only around 1.8% in 2025. Which policies or political decisions or even political failures,
02:37some might say, have led us to where we are today? Which is holding back progress?
02:41Yeah. Thank you very much for that question. It's an excellent point. I think what we see actually in 2025
02:48is that there is some positive news. So 2025 is sort of an uptick in energy efficiency progress globally,
02:54compared to last year. However, as we see as well, is that over a sort of longer-term horizon,
03:00the average progress since 2019, the average progress this decade in terms of energy efficiency,
03:05is somewhat lower than the progress we saw previous decades, around 1.3% on average per year since 2019.
03:12And I think the first thing to mention is industry. We see that since 2019, two-thirds of global energy
03:20demand growth has come from the industrial sector. At the same time in that industrial sector, energy
03:27efficiency progress there has sort of flatlined and dropped to around 0.5% per year on average.
03:33So there's a real slowdown in efficiency progress there. At the same time, we also see that policy has
03:40sort of lagged technological progress. Lucas, you mentioned policy there. You also touched upon
03:46industry. If we understand that technology is rapidly evolving and there's already much technology in
03:52place, what is the real barrier to efficiency progress? Is it just a geographical trend? Is it
03:58capital? Or are we merely waiting for policy to catch up? First of all, we see a shift of where industry
04:04takes place, sort of shift towards different regions in the world, but also towards more energy intensive
04:09industry in some cases. But if we then specifically focus on policy, we also see there's a little bit
04:16less of a policy focus on the industrial sector in many countries. So of the sort of 250 policy
04:22announcements that we've seen in 2025 on energy efficiency, just over 35 of those were happening
04:29specifically in the industrial sectors. But the good news is that in many cases, the technologies are
04:35available to scale up efficiency progress in the industrial sector, especially in the sort of less
04:39intensive industrial sectors. There are many opportunities to electrify using heat pumps, for
04:44example, in processes to electrify industrial heat. Lucas, is it fair to say that in recent years, governments
04:50have pretty much ignored the IEA's advice when it comes to energy efficiency? And as we know, your report
04:56is referencing is emphasizing the need for us to close those policy gaps. So why do you think it will be
05:02different in 2026? And why should the public have faith that it will be different this time around?
05:07Yeah, it's an excellent question. I think what we've seen is that two years ago in 2023, governments
05:13around the world came together in Dubai at the climate conference COP28, where they set the ambition
05:19themselves for 2030 to aim to double global energy efficiency improvements by that year. And unfortunately,
05:25since that year, we've seen progress not double yet. However, I don't think that means that governments
05:31don't still have that ambition. And I think one interesting thing that we see specifically this year is that
05:37governments have sort of started to recognize the role of energy efficiency, not just for emission reductions,
05:42but for sort of wider economic and energy policy priorities. You can think in this case of affordability,
05:48for example, so lowering household energy bills, but also industrial competitiveness,
05:53making sure that businesses are competitive, and lastly, energy security. And I think Europe,
05:59for example, is an excellent example where there are many new policies announced that sort of take energy
06:06efficiency to improve these different aspects of people's lives and of businesses in Europe.
06:12The best case scenario, as the IEA sees it, is for efficiency gains to more than double annually to meet
06:18global climate and energy goals. So which single action do you believe would really speed things
06:24up the most? And how soon could it have an impact? What is very promising is that we see that in many
06:29countries there are existing policy frameworks in place already. So if I had to give one recommendation of
06:34what countries can do quickly to accelerate progress in terms of energy efficiency is to take those existing
06:40policies that they have and raise the ambition on those. That's often one of the most fast and
06:46effective ways to raise efficiency progress. And that can be done in the building sector,
06:50in the industry sector and in the transport sector. Lastly, Lucas, the IEA's World Energy Outlook 2025
06:57warns that energy security risks now come from both fossil fuel markets and critical minerals for clean
07:03energy. Which of these, in your opinion, is more urgent and needing to be prioritized by governments today?
07:09We often joke a little bit, but call energy efficiency the first fuel here at the IEA.
07:14And I think for many of the challenges that governments face at the moment, whether that's
07:19affordability, energy security, like you mentioned, or competitiveness, energy efficiency can play a
07:24role in addressing all of those challenges. So I think it's important for countries to realize that,
07:29to unlock those benefits and then hopefully accelerate progress.
07:32And there we have to leave our conversation, Lucas. But thank you so much for joining me from
07:36Paris today. It was great to speak to you. Thank you very much, Rebecca. And thank you
07:39for Energy Frontier for having me. It was a pleasure. Well, that is a wrap of our show.
07:44I very much hope that you enjoyed it. And for more episodes in the Energy Frontier series,
07:49just head to Euronews.com. Thanks again for watching and I'll see you soon.
