The Age of Power
How the electrotech and information revolution are converging – and what this means for energy, markets and geopolitics
16 Sep 2026
4 Minutes Read
Highlights
-99%
The cost decline of the electric stack – chips, batteries, power electronics, motors and sensors – that powers both revolutions.
-70-80%
How far transport and household energy costs can fall when electrotech and infotech are deployed together.
97%
The share of the world’s people living in a country where solar and wind potential is over ten times its current electricity demand.
Executive summary
The race of the 21st century is the race to master the electron – and it is well under way.
The world runs on two foundations: energy and information. Energy does work; information directs it. The digital revolution shifted information onto electrons; the electrotech revolution is shifting energy onto electrons as well.
The two revolutions have far more in common than many assume. Beyond running on electrons, they share a history, a physics, a supply chain, a geography and the same scaling laws. Many of today’s electrotech entrepreneurs even came out of digital tech, from Robin Zeng to Greg Jackson.
Beyond what they share is their impact on one another. Each revolution extends the capabilities and reach of the other. Combined, they cut costs further than either could alone. Together, their impact is far greater.
Key takeaways
01
The electrification of information and energy
In information, over 99% of the world’s memory storage and communication is already digital, and so runs on electrons. Now with AI, thinking itself is moving onto electrons too. In energy, electricity overtook oil as the largest source of useful energy in 2007. Since then, renewables have made electrons cheap, digitalisation and AI have made them smart, and batteries have made them mobile. The combination is speeding up electrification.
02
One shared tech stack makes two revolutions turn the same flywheel.
Five components – chips, batteries, power electronics, motors and sensors – sit inside the machines of both revolutions, so each purchase of one makes the others cheaper. The smartphone made the battery cheap enough for the car; the car made it cheap enough for the grid. Since 1990, their combined cost has fallen by 99%.
03
Each revolution now needs the other to overcome its own limits.
AI’s limits are increasingly electrical. It needs power and grid connections, fast. And physical AI needs economy-wide electrification, since it demands end-use with far greater precision and responsiveness than fossil fuels can offer. Likewise, electrotech’s limits are increasingly in coordination: smoothing a variable, distributed supply, flexing an idle demand and optimising an underutilised grid – a challenge infotech helps address.
04
Deployed together, electrotech and infotech can collapse costs across transport, homes and industry.
Move a household onto electrotech, then optimise its usage, and running costs fall by up to 80%. Electrify motion and automate driving, and freight and taxi costs fall by up to 70%. Combine electrification with advanced automation, and manufacturing costs fall by 40-70%.
05
Few countries fuse the two revolutions together.
Most are pursuing one revolution alone, or both apart. The US leads in AI but lags in electrotech; Europe leads in renewables but lags in electrification and has little AI. The standout exception is China: since 2010 it has more than doubled its electricity supply, taken electric vehicles (EVs) from zero to over 60% of new car sales and built the world’s largest robot fleet and the second-largest AI data-centre fleet.
The transformation ahead comes in three stages. The first, this decade, is growth amid friction: electrotech and infotech costs will keep falling, performance will keep improving and deployment will keep rising. Bottlenecks, bubbles and backlash are all but guaranteed, but will not be enough to hold back the tide of change.
The second, in the early 2030s, is disruption to four sources of power, as power shifts from the few big and centralised to the many small, distributed and fast. In energy, from concentrated fossil supply to millions of electric technologies; in industry, from large incumbents to faster innovators; in geopolitics, from a few resource-rich states to many technology-deploying ones; and in defence, from concentrated platforms to distributed swarms.
The third, further ahead, is a new electric world. Electric energy and intelligence promise decentralisation, faster decarbonisation, greater sovereignty and new-found abundance. But these same revolutions could concentrate manufacturing in fewer hands, put dangerous intelligence in every pocket and entrench autarky. A world of ubiquitous energy and intelligence may be richer and cleverer – but not necessarily wiser.
The electron is now the frontier of both action and intelligence – the foundation of power itself. The economies that harness both revolutions together, not one alone, will lead the Age of Power. Success rests on securing cheap electricity and capital, using these new tools to build energy and digital sovereignty and taking a stake in the electro-industrial base. The race of the 21st century is the race to master the electron, and it’s well under way.
Too often, electrotech and infotech are treated as separate revolutions. In reality, they are deeply intertwined, and each increasingly depends on the other to advance. Together, they will do far more than make existing systems cheaper or better: they will shift power from large, centralised incumbents towards millions of smaller, faster and more distributed technologies and actors. That creates enormous opportunities for abundance, agency and sovereignty, but also new risks of concentration, disruption and misuse. Only by understanding the forces of infotech and electrotech together can we seize the opportunities and guard against the perils of the Age of Power.
Technology is providing us with solutions that unleash a world of energy after fire. Countries that wish to prosper need to deploy electrotech and infotech and find their niche in this new environment.
This is truly important research, as it lays out the direction of travel so clearly for governments and business across the globe – merge the two ongoing revolutions or get left behind. This year, these will be some of the critical topics at Climate Week NYC. With a sharp focus on the electrification of economies and on the implications and opportunities of the tech revolution, we’re setting the stage for COP31-discussions and boardroom decisions on key issues.
Helen Clarkson OBE
CEO of Climate Group, Organisers of Climate Week NYC
CEO of Climate Group, Organisers of Climate Week NYC
Most energy planning still assumes electricity demand and digital adoption belong in separate models, run by separate teams, reviewed on separate timelines. That assumption no longer holds. AI adoption drives electricity demand, and electrification shapes what AI can do next, each reinforcing the other. That feedback loop of modernization is an underrated force in the energy transition.
Vincent Petit
Senior Vice President Climate and Energy Transition Research, Schneider Electric
Senior Vice President Climate and Energy Transition Research, Schneider Electric
Supporting materials
Downloads
Methodology
Below we provide a list of key sources used throughout the report. Electricity generation uses Ember’s Electricity Data Explorer. Final energy comes from the IEA’s World Energy Balances. Electrification is electricity’s share of final energy. Useful energy comes from IIASA’s Primary, Final and Useful Energy Database, built by Simon De Stercke. Forward fossil and emissions scenarios are from Rystad Energy.
Electric vehicle sales come from the IEA Global EV Data Explorer. Cost curves for most of the electric tech stack use Not Boring’s The Electric Slide. AI compute and chips draw on Epoch AI and SEMI. Trade flows are built from UN Comtrade, aggregated into electrotech and fossil baskets and measured across blocs to avoid double counting.
Firmed solar costs and solar potential come from Ember’s Solar and Battery Atlas.
Acknowledgements
With thanks to
Amory Lovins, Ardhi Arsala Rahmani, Bill McKibben, Biqing Yang, Bruce Douglas, Bryony Worthington, Caroline Cook, Chris Nelder, Dave Jones, Dimitri Zenghelis, Emily Nurse, Francisco Laverón, Hannah Broadbent, Hannah Ritchie, Harry Benham, Harry Krejsa, Jardine Wall, Jules Kortenhorst, Mark Campanale, Michael Collins, Mike Hemsley, Phil MacDonald, Phoebe Benich, Rashmi Mishra, Rini Sucahyo, Simon Sharpe, Thijs Van de Graaf, Thomas Kwan, Tim Buckley and Vincent Petit.
Cover image
A yellow robotic arm operates on solar modules moving along an automated assembly line inside an industrial factory environment.
Credit: Marco Verch / ccnull.de
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