In brief | 23 July ‘26

IEA: Global electricity demand growth set to accelerate as power systems adjust to recent shocks

Industry, electric vehicles, air conditioning and data centres continue to spur robust increases in electricity use around the world.

Reuters: How one German city’s struggle to decarbonise is a litmus test for Europe’s green industrial policy

The extent to which electrification, green hydrogen, carbon capture and storage, and thermal energy storage are adopted in Remscheid will be a litmus test for whether the entire 27-nation bloc has a chance of meeting its ambitious climate goals.

Reuters: Morocco-Germany $30 billion power cable stalled by governance disagreements, sources say

A 30 billion US dollar project to provide Germany with renewable energy from Morocco via what would be the world's ‌longest intercontinental undersea power link is being held up by disagreements over structure and guarantees, four sources said.

Le Monde: Wildfires ravage parts of southern France, Italy and Spain

Thousands have been evacuated amid wildfires that have been raging across several southern European regions for days.

FT: Europe’s flash drought comes as heat causes ‘atmospheric thirst’, scientists say

Rivers and water flows low as evaporation rates rise in extreme warm conditions, study finds.

World Weather Attribution: Increasingly hot Europe faces more severe droughts and growing challenges for water and land management

With forecasts indicating little relief in the near term, the summer of 2026 is emerging as one of Europe’s most significant heat and drought events in recent years.

Eurostat: Renewables make up 26% of EU energy use

Provisional data for 2025 show that the share of energy from renewable sources in gross final energy consumption in the EU reached 26.2 percent, up from 25.2 percent in 2024.