Energy-importing countries added 2.2 percentage points of non-fossil energy to their primary mix over the past five years — more than three times the 0.7 points gained by exporting regions, according to the tenth edition of DNV's Energy Transition Outlook.

The gap covers China, India and Europe on one side and the Middle East, North America and Russia on the other. Governments in importing countries are expanding domestically produced power to cut reliance on imported oil and gas, while exporters outside the Middle East are raising production to cover disrupted supplies — and decarbonizing more slowly as a result.

Disruption to the Strait of Hormuz is reinforcing both dynamics, DNV said.

What does prolonged conflict do to demand?

DNV's main forecast now sees the Middle East supplying around 40% of global oil production in 2050, down from 50% in last year's outlook, as importers diversify supply.

A sensitivity case assumes the Middle East conflict runs to 2030 with moderately elevated oil and gas prices. Under that scenario, global oil and gas demand would run 4–6% lower while the conflict persists, and would remain 2–5% below the main forecast for the rest of the period — permanent demand destruction as consumers and governments accelerate the shift to alternatives.

"Energy security is redrawing the map of the energy transition," said Ditlev Engel, CEO – Energy Systems at DNV. "Importing regions are accelerating electrification, renewables and storage to reduce their exposure to the most insecure fossil-fuel markets. Exporters, meanwhile, are responding to today's shortages by increasing investments and production. The result is a widening divide in the speed and direction of the transition."

Engel added that there should be no doubt the transition is happening and already large in scale, but must be accelerated: "everyone is starting to recognise that energy is now part of our critical infrastructure and must be prioritised accordingly."

Which technologies are winning?

DNV draws a line between mature technologies riding falling costs and emerging technologies losing policy support:

• Solar PV and onshore wind are increasingly displacing fossil fuels from power generation.
• Installed battery capacity has grown 14-fold over the past five years.
• Hydrogen in DNV's long-term forecast is down 29% versus last year's outlook; carbon capture and storage is down 15%, with both still expected to grow rapidly from a low base but needing stronger policy support to bridge the cost gap.
• Nuclear holds its share of global power generation, with installed capacity up 30% over the next decade and 170% by 2060 despite high costs and supply-chain risks.

Technologies needed to decarbonize hard-to-electrify sectors are not being prioritized because of cost and industrial-competitiveness concerns, the report said.

How big is the AI power surge?

Global data-centre electricity consumption will almost triple from around 400 TWh in 2025 to 1,100 TWh in 2030, with AI overtaking conventional data-centre workloads in 2031, DNV forecasts.

Even so, data centres including AI will contribute less to global electricity-demand growth to 2040 than either electric-vehicle charging or space cooling. Growth concentrates first in North America, where data centres will absorb roughly one-third of the increase in power generation to 2030; in China, data-centre power demand growth is less of a concern.

"Driven by solar, wind and increasingly battery storage, electricity is emerging as the clear winner of the energy transition," said Sverre Alvik, Director of Energy Transition Research at DNV. "The pace of electrification over the next two decades will be more than twice that of the past two decades. Although importing countries are leading the shift, fossil-fuel exporters are also embracing electrification because it delivers greater efficiency and lower costs."

What is the emissions trajectory?

DNV forecasts energy-related emissions falling 44% by mid-century, putting the world on course for 2.3°C of warming — beyond the ambitions of the Paris Agreement. Net-zero emissions are not expected until the 2090s, and that timeline is uncertain because it relies on technologies such as direct air capture that have yet to deploy at scale.

The watch item for oil and gas producers: whether exporters' slower transition hardens into permanent demand loss, with DNV's conflict sensitivity already pricing in a 2–5% structural reduction against the main case.