The International Energy Agency published Key Questions on Energy and AI on 16 April 2026. The report updates the agency’s 2025 work with new data and analysis, revisiting electricity demand as well as grid and supply-chain constraints. It also considers the implications for energy affordability, security and sustainability.
For infrastructure planning, the value of an update is the opportunity to revisit assumptions made when a project was first proposed. A demand forecast, a connection schedule and a facility budget can move on different timelines.
Questions for a project review
Our view is that teams should be able to trace a capacity proposal from its market assumptions to its physical dependencies. Which assumptions came from a sector forecast? Which are supported by a site-specific commitment? Which still require engineering work or a commercial agreement?
A revised industry outlook should prompt those questions without being treated as evidence that a particular facility is ready. The project still needs a defensible connection date, a workable cooling design and a delivery sequence that matches customer commitments.
For a project already in development, the next step is a dated review of its assumptions: what changed, what remains supported and which commitment should be reconsidered before more capital is deployed.