Kearney: What to Expect in Energy & Sustainability at Davos

In Davos, world leaders and executives of industry are gathering for the World Economic Forum’s 2025 summit.

This year, thousands — including more than 50 heads of state — are convening under the theme of Collaboration for the Intelligent Age.

This is a big deal, particularly for the sustainability, energy and technology sectors. 

The summit serves as a platform for sustainability and innovation — topics that have dominated the agenda in recent years — and reflects growing concerns over climate change, biodiversity loss and social inequality.

Speaking to Sustainability Magazine from Davos is Richard Forrest, Partner & Region Chair for Europe at Kearney, which became the first carbon neutral consultancy in 2010.

Richard is Partner and Region Chair for Europe, working closely on the firm’s global sustainability efforts — an area he cites as both a challenge and an exciting opportunity for clients across all regions and sectors. 

“Having worked in more than 30 countries, I have extensive experience across the energy and chemicals sector, with a focus on helping clients effectively address the energy transition,” he says.

He is also Chair of both the Kearney Energy Transition Institute and innovative tech start-up EV8, which is accelerating the adoption of EVs.

Here, he shares his insights from Davos so far and what else can be expected from the 2025 summit.

In your own words, how does Kearney positively contribute to the energy and sustainability sectors?

At Kearney, we work closely with clients, nations, nongovernmental organisations and communities to support their sustainability initiatives and programmes.

Part of our strategy is to develop ambitious, tangible and value-creating strategies that embed sustainability into an organisation and its value chain. 

We’re committed to building resilience against the physical and transition risks of climate change, helping firms to future-proof operations. 

We do this by embedding and executing decarbonisation pathways for successful low-carbon businesses and their supply chains, from sourcing and manufacturing to delivery. 

What are the key sustainability and energy transition topics you expect to dominate discussions at Davos 2025, given this year’s theme of ‘Collaboration for the Intelligent Age’?

There are certainly going to be questions about the direction and pace of the US Energy Transition and commitment to the Paris agreement, alongside the impact of a major shift in policy. 

Beyond this, the impact of global trade of technologies and raw material on the development of energy transition will be another prominent discussion point. 

Competition is intensifying around energy technologies and leadership, which could lead to a possible fracturing of global trade and a rising tide of industrial protectionism, particularly for EVs, solar PV and batteries.

Renewable and nuclear energy will also be high on the agenda at Davos, as the shift to ‘productisation’ allows more cost-effective options around technologies such as solar, battery storage and Small Modular Reactor technology in nuclear. 

Looking more broadly, global energy consumption reached a record 620 EJ in 2023 and fossil fuels still dominate as a source of energy worldwide, but there is also reason for optimism in Davos this year. 

Renewable electricity production also reached a new high of 4,748TWh and COP28, saw 24 countries set a goal of tripling nuclear energy capacity by 2050.

What innovative solutions or partnerships do you anticipate emerging from this year's WEF summit to address the urgent climate challenges?

At Kearney, we recognise that sustainability is a cross-value chain, cross-industry imperative across corporations, governments and society as a whole.

While the technologies needed to tackle a major part of climate change are largely known, the challenge lies in scaling and integrating them through robust public, private and academic partnerships. 

Collaboration is especially critical for first-of-a-kind projects, where early-stage partnerships can drive better solutions, reduce costs and accelerate the pace of delivery. 

Davos underscores the power of collective effort in this space — alignment on these key issues will lead to faster progress on tackling the current climate challenges.

How can business leaders like yourself contribute to fostering collaboration between the private sector, governments and civil society on sustainability issues?

Leaders need to address energy transition and sustainability as an opportunity for business growth and advantage.

Integrating sustainability into all business choices enables bottom-line and sustainability outcomes to be delivered together.   

By championing strategic alliances and partnerships, business leaders can accelerate the adoption of low-carbon energy solutions and embed sustainable thinking across industries.

Sharing best practices and development strategies will be vital to build momentum, while supporting investors to design and implement their decarbonisation strategy will ensure that capital can keep flowing into impactful solutions. 

Equally important is communicating and informing on the business opportunities that align with reducing greenhouse gas emissions, demonstrating that sustainability should be aligned with company targets for the year ahead.

Given your experience in large-scale energy transition projects, what role do you see emerging technologies playing in accelerating sustainable business practices as discussed at Davos?

Unsurprisingly, AI will be top of the agenda. 

It will have multiple uses to support sustainability and energy transition — from optimising new ways of delivering energy with greater capital efficiency, the scope for this technology is huge. 

A key point of discussion at Davos this year will be around using AI to drive emerging technologies down the cost-curve, replicating the success seen with utility-scale solar PV.

Since 2010, the global cost of solar PV has fallen by a factor of 10, while installed capacity has been doubling every three years. 

AI and other digital solutions — like machine learning, IoT and Blockchain — can drive efficiency and resource optimisation through enabling circular economy strategies, whether that is with better product design, recycling or business models. 

Another priority is accelerating the electrification across applications like road transport, industrial processes and buildings, supported by the development of power grids. 

This will require leveraging low-carbon sources such as nuclear, solar, wind, geothermal and hydro, coupled with the distribution of smart grid technologies to drive change.

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