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Albert Einstein is quoted as saying, “I never think of the future – it comes soon enough.” It’s a little hard to believe that a time-traveling genius like Einstein never thought about the future, but the quote provides a subtle caution about making predictions—they’re tough to get right. Like the West called to the pioneers, though, the future attracts speculation. It’s certain to happen but is not set. That makes it irresistible to talk about, especially since the 2025 energy horizon is not as foggy as it has been in past years.
The most obvious trend in motion for the year ahead is that artificial intelligence (AI) and the power demands it puts on the grid will be the tectonic force that shapes energy consumption. Data centers eat up unfathomable amounts of energy. Each of the estimated 1 billion ChatGPT queries made every day takes 2.9 watt-hours—ten times more than the 0.3 watt-hours required by each of the 5.6 billion traditional Google searches that happen every day. In fact, if the growth in data centers meets expectations, we’re going to need to add the equivalent of three New York Cities’ worth of power supply in the next 5 years.
How does this shape the energy future? It’s already happening.
This past September, Constellation Energy entered into a 20-year power contract with Microsoft to restart the Unit 1 reactor at Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania. The plant, to be named the Crane Clean Energy Center, will restart in the first quarter of 2025. Crane is a harbinger of things to come. If all goes as planned, don’t be surprised to see a dozen or more new nuclear power plant announcements in the year to come. There’s a twist – these new nuclear facilities will be funded by corporations, not the government.
Watch for two subsequent developments: 1. Calls for, and progress made on, substantially streamlined permitting for nuclear plants and 2. Small modular nuclear reactors (SMNRs) cooled by sodium becoming the design of choice. Sodium operates at higher temperatures and lower pressures than current light water-cooled reactors, improving the efficiency and safety of the system.
2025 will be the year we declare victory for those who have championed an “all of the above” or “wide path” energy philosophy. The wide path is the central theme of Tucker Perkins’ book, Path to Zero, and it will be the tide upon which many other energy sources will ride, including:
- Wind and solar. These stay at the energy table in 2025, but they won’t get the spotlight they’ve had in the past. Intermittency and local permitting stalled by not-in-my-backyard protests will slow deployment of these renewables. That said, advances in solar technology such as chemical bonding, photocatalysis and heterojunctions, will take solar energy capture to a new level of efficiency in 2025.
- A little more hydrogen. Hydrogen got a lot of attention in 2024. It will take a back seat in the year ahead but find some spotlight in an announcement or two from electric power generators who will roll out plans for an eventual switch-over from natural gas to hydrogen.
- A little more geothermal. Geothermal meets less than 1% of global energy demand today but will continue to grow incrementally in the year ahead, especially in places like Texas where horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing technology has been perfected. Its fan base will grow because it’s firm, clean and now, cost-effective.
- A LOT more propane and renewable propane. As regulators continue to tighten CO2 and air quality emission standards, low carbon intensity renewable propane will displace more and more diesel as new medium- and heavy-duty truck engine technology finally comes online. Renewable propane capacity will grow beyond 70 million gallons in the year ahead.
- Additionally, propane installations will grow into the power generation energy of choice as property owners invest in off-grid resiliency systems including home and small commercial generators and high-efficiency, signal-sensitive, heat pumps. Both will be smarter, switching on not just when the grid blacks out, but when grid power demand (and pricing) is high.
What won’t change in 2025? Progress. Everything about the energy system will continue to evolve, from its sources to the ways consumers use energy to empower their lives.
