AI, Data Centers and Energy Demand: Reassessing and Exploring the Trends
The information and communication technologies sector today accounts for 9% of global electricity consumption, data centers for 1-1.3%, and artificial intelligence (AI) for less than 0.2%. The growing energy demands of cloud services first, and now AI workloads (10% of today’s data centers electricity demand), have exacerbated this trend. In the future, hyperscale data centers will gain shares amongst all kinds of data centers and AI will probably account for around 20% of data centers electricity demand by 2030.
How the US under Trump Became a Strategic and Ideological Adversary of Europe
The Europeans' worst security nightmare seems to be coming true: on Tuesday, February 18, 2025, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov met in Saudi Arabia to initiate the normalization of relations between their two countries. The meeting also aimed to set up peace negotiations for Ukraine. However, despite having the potential to affect the entire continent, the discussions took place without the Europeans or the Ukrainians being present.
The China-Russia Partnership and the Ukraine War: Aligned but not allied
China and Russia maintain a strategic partnership rooted in shared opposition to the U.S. and liberal democracies, but their relationship is shaped more by pragmatism than trust.
Technical Standards, Soft Connectivity and China’s Belt and Road: Towards greater convergence or fragmentation?
As the intensification of geopolitical competition points toward increased global fragmentation, the definition of technical standards for future markets and industries will play an important role in determining just how deep the fissures will run.
India's Modi heads to Paris as co-chair of AI summit
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is visiting France from Monday as co-chair of an international summit on artificial intelligence in Paris that is expected to be attended by industry leaders, including executives from OpenAI and DeepSeek.
Taking the Pulse: Has Political Deadlock in Member States Become a Strategic Problem for the EU?
At a pivotal moment for the EU, several of its member states are experiencing domestic political and economic crises. Is this hindering collective EU action in response to the challenges posed by Russia, China, and Trump’s administration?
How do maritime companies cooperate with the navies? An interview with Simon Bergulf, MÆRSK
On the sidelines of the Paris Naval Conference 2025, on February 4, 2025, organized by Ifri and the French Navy (Marine nationale), Simon BERGULF, Group Representative Europe Public and Regulatory Affairs, Head of Energy transition and Operations, Maersk, shares insights on how maritime companies collaborate with the navies to secure maritime economy.
How do maritime companies cooperate with the navies? An interview with Evan FUERY, EQUINOR
On the sidelines of the Paris Naval Conference 2025, on February 4, 2025, organized by Ifri and the French Navy (Marine nationale), Evan FUERY, Senior Vice-President for Corporate Security and Crisis Management, EQUINOR, shares insights on how maritime companies collaborate with the navies to secure maritime economy.
Replay - Affirming European security in times of uncertainty: Poland’s priorities for its Presidency
Poland will assume the presidency of the Council of the EU throughout the first semester of 2025, when geopolitical tensions are likely to peak. Watch the replay of the videoconference "Affirming European security in times of uncertainty. Poland’s priorities of its presidency of the Council".
Replay - The Future European Space Law: a New Model of Development?
Replay of the conference from Ifri's Space Program, December 16, 2024.
Europe’s Black Mass Evasion: From Black Box to Strategic Recycling
EV batteries recycling is a building block for boosting the European Union (EU)’s strategic autonomy in the field of critical raw minerals (CRM) value chains. Yet, recent evolutions in the European EV value chain, marked by cancellations or postponements of projects, are raising the alarm on the prospects of the battery recycling industry in Europe.
Replay - Shaping Europe’s Technological Sovereignty
Watch Ifri's Center for Geopolitics of Technology's annual conference replay.
Will Europe's pivot to Asia have any teeth?
Spurred by fears of a ‘new Ukraine’ in East Asia, European powers are ramping up their presence in the Indo-Pacific.
China’s Mature Node Overcapacity: Unfounded Fears
China is decoupling from, not flooding, the global mature-node semiconductor market. As China increasingly pursues industrial policies encouraging domestic chip production, its own growing chip demand will prevent a direct flood of cheap Chinese chips on foreign shores. However, as Beijing achieves its goal of decreasing the reliance of domestic downstream manufacturers on foreign chips, European and American mature-node semiconductor companies will feel the ripple effects of an increasingly “involuted” Chinese chip ecosystem.
NATO: 75 Years of Strategic Solidarity (replay)
The war in Ukraine, burden-sharing between Allies, U.S. disengagement from Europe, new areas of conflict... At a time when the Alliance has just celebrated its 75th anniversary and the Stoltenberg era is drawing to a close after ten years at the head of the organization, NATO's agenda bears witness to the diversity of its areas of action, as well as to the different perceptions of the Allies on these issues.
In the wake of the Washington summit, this conference of diplomats, military officers and researchers aims to analyze the short- and medium-term prospects for the Atlantic Alliance.
The Troubled Reorganization of Critical Raw Materials Value Chains: An Assessment of European De-risking Policies
With the demand for critical raw materials set to, at a minimum, double by 2030 in the context of the current energy transition policies, the concentration of critical raw materials (CRM) supplies and, even more, of refining capacities in a handful of countries has become one of the paramount issues in international, bilateral and national discussions. China’s dominant position and successive export controls on critical raw materials (lately, germanium, gallium, rare earths processing technology, graphite, antimony) point to a trend of weaponizing critical dependencies.
EUDIS, HEDI, DIANA: What's behind Three Defense Innovation Acronyms?
In Europe, with Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine showing little sign of abating, a persistent gap remains between security needs and defense spending. According to a 2006 commitment enshrined at the 2014 Wales NATO summit, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) members should disburse no less than 2% of their national gross domestic product (GDP) on defense, out of which 20% is to be spent on equipment and research and development. In 2024, only 23 Allies out of 32 are expected to meet or exceed this target, though a significant improvement from only three in 2014. This total includes the United States (US) devoting 3.38% of its GDP to defense, constituting almost 70% of all NATO member defense spending combined.
Global Financial Shifts: The Impact of Dollar Sanctions and Frozen Russian Assets
An interview with Brad Setser, Whitney Shepardson Senior Fellow (Council on Foreign Relations) led at Ifri on September 24, 2024.
Dollar-based financial sanctions have been increasing, particularly since the beginning of the century. Is this phenomenon likely to significantly alter the international role of the dollar?
There is a lot of controversy about the in which way frozen assets from Russia’s central bank should be treated, regarding both the assets themselves and the associated revenues. What consequences do you foresee for the international financial system?
State Elections in Thuringia, Saxony and Brandenburg - Extreme Parties on the Rise?
The Alternative for Germany (AfD) became Germany's strongest political force in the regional elections in Thuringia and Saxony.
Towards a European Nuclear Deterrent
While major European powers may have to contemplate nuclear deterrence without America, the national flexibility and European financial support required to make it feasible is currently difficult to imagine.
Neither Left nor Right, but Both? The Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW) in the Wake of European Elections
The 2024 European elections not only provided the occasion for a new German party, the “Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht” (BSW), to emerge but also to obtain 6.2% of the vote.
National Perspectives on Europe's De-risking from China
The concept of “de-risking” has become a significant focus for the European Union (EU) in managing its relations with China since first proposed by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in March 2023. However, the interpretation and policy responses to de-risking vary across Europe, reflecting diverse national perspectives.
European Union–Republic of Korea Cooperation on Economic Security: Opportunities, Limits and Challenges
This piece is a revised version of a paper presented at the conference on “New Convergences in EU-ROK Economic Security Relations”, organised in Rome on 30 January 2024 by the Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI).
The New Russian Diaspora: Europe’s Challenge and Opportunity
This report assesses both the scale and the roots of the outward migration from the Russian Federation coinciding with Putin’s turning of Russia into an aggressive authoritarian state.
Groundbreaking Chip Sovereignty: Europe’s Strategic Push in the Semiconductor Race
The EU Chips Act’s enactment in September 2023 marks a major policy shift that revitalizes industrial policy in Europe. By allowing state subsidies for semiconductor projects, it has the potential to secure Europe’s supply chain security and technological autonomy in an industry dominated by the US and East Asia.
European Solar PV Manufacturing: Terminal Decline or Hope for a Rebirth?
While solar photovoltaic (PV) installations are booming in Europe (and in other parts of the world), the local industry is closing down. Over the past two years, the European installed solar PV capacity has been multiplied by two. On the other hand, the remaining European manufacturers of solar PV panels are dying.
Electric Vehicles: A Strong and Still Understated Performance
Electric vehicles (EVs) are better for the climate – even in worst-case scenarios. Across its life cycle, a typical European electric car produces less greenhouse gas (GHG) and air pollutants or noise than its petrol or diesel equivalent. Emissions are usually higher in the production phase, but these are more than offset over time by lower emissions in the use phase. According to the European Environment Agency’s report on electric vehicles, life cycle GHG emissions of EVs are about 17-30% lower than those of petrol and diesel cars.
How Can the Green Deal Adapt to a Brutal World?
The European Green Deal has not been planned for the current extraordinarily deteriorated internal and external environment. Russia’s war in Ukraine, higher interest rates, inflation, strained public finances, weakened value chains, and lack of crucial skills pose unprecedented challenges.
Climate, Finance, and Geopolitics: Human Self-delusions and the Challenges for Europe
The combination of geopolitical tensions, climate disruption, and the growing role of finance in the economy is taking us into uncharted territory. Until recently, each of these subjects was handled separately, but they are now inextricably linked by two shared characteristics: the gravity of the threat, and the fact that they all lay bare the scale of human self-delusions.
Decarbonizing European Cities: How to Speed Up and Build Synergies?
Cities are on the front line for enabling governments to meet their commitments under the Paris Agreement. Although cities occupy only 2% of the earth’s surface, they are home to between 50 and 60% of the world’s population (70% by 2050 according to the United Nations), account for two-thirds of the world’s energy consumption and emit 80% of CO2. As an example, the CO2 emissions of the city of Berlin are equal to those of Croatia, Jordan or the Dominican Republic. New York’s total annual CO2 emissions are roughly equivalent to those of Bangladesh. Yet their central role not only for adaptation, but also mitigation, has been recognized lately.
2024: A Pivotal Year for the Space Sector?
2024 could be a pivotal year for space exploration. New launchers are set to make their first flight, satellite constellations and other trends promise to redefine the way space is explored and exploited.
New Impulses for Stagnant Relationships - German-French Ministerial Council Meets in a New Format
As the doors of the illustrious Hôtel Beauharnais on Rue de Lille 78 swung open on the evening of 4 October, and the masses streamed into the German Embassy in Paris to celebrate German Unity Day, the reports of the currently strained state of Franco-German relations seemed almost surreal.
How to Meet the Industrial Challenge of Electric Mobility in France and in Europe
The deployment at scale of electric mobility in France and in Europe withholds significant industrial, societal, geopolitical, and financial challenges, against the backdrop of strategic dependencies along the value chain of the electric vehicle (EV).
Impossible Decoupling, Improbable Cooperation: Economic Interdependencies in the Face of Power Rivalries
Export restrictions, economic and financial sanctions, politicization of monetary and financial choices, screening of inward and outward foreign direct investments, exceptional customs duties, and state interventions in sectors deemed strategic: the political vise is tightening around international economic and financial relations.
The End of a Happy Parenthesis. How the War in UkraineI Is Forcing Germany to Rethink Its Model
The period of peace, economic prosperity, and political stability that Germany has experienced since the end of the Cold War ends with the Ukrainian war. The shock wave of this conflict particularly hit its economy and thereby undermines the foundations on which Germany had based its power, its international influence and established its identity.
Europe's Space Sector: Caught in a Strategic Stranglehold
Europe's space sector is currently faced with great difficulties, marked by the temporary loss of autonomous access to space, strong competition from the USA, and the transformation of the satellite market.
Europe: Turning to the Union to Respond to Citizens
To deal with the internal and external challenges of a new era, the European Union must reform its institutions: review Member States' right of veto, strengthen the Commission, and take action on foreign policy and security matters, energy, the single market and the economy, social policy, health and immigration—while at the same time considering expansion. This is the only way for the Union to preserve the values of freedom and democracy that underlie European integration.
European Union: A Geopolitical Illusion?
The European Union (EU) is holding firm in the face of the war in Ukraine—perhaps better than expected. But what long-term effects will the war have on European institutions and policies? The institutions will need to be changed to cope with the forthcoming expansions. The EU has certainly made progress toward common industrial and technological policies. But will this dynamic do away with a conception of strategic autonomy, encompassing both diplomacy and strategy? The European Union, which will undoubtedly be a key mover of future changes for the continent, remains largely uncertain in terms of its future configurations.
A framework for a Win-Win Europe-Africa Energy and Climate Partnership
North-South tensions are exacerbated at a time of unprecedented turmoil for both Europeans and Africans. European polycrises (geopolitical, energy-related and economic) echo the systematic vulnerability of Africans, which is reinforced by external shocks.
Türkiye’s Stifled Ambitions
As its elections have unfolded this spring, Türkiye has again shown itself to be symptomatic of the times. Across the world, numerous political regimes oscillate between democratic forms of government and an authoritarian concentration of power; impressive periods of growth give way to inflation and recession; and international deregulation gives rise to widespread diplomacy in an effort to juggle a myriad of shifting political loyalties. Faced with the war in Ukraine, Ankara is playing a strong hand by enlarging its areas of presence and intervention. Türkiye is more important to its partners than ever, independent of its eventual domestic trajectory.
Western discourse predicted the advent of Chinese dominance in the very short term, but events have taken a rather different turn. The drivers that enabled the unprecedented growth of recent decades seem to have run out of steam. Moreover, the outcome of Beijing’s economic strategies is still uncertain, in a context shaped primarily by U.S. policies. China’s influence in the future will be considerable, but the direction its rebound will take remains unclear.
For Europeans, the events in Ukraine and the thorny issue of the Sino-American rivalry cannot paper over the other security problems we face: On what common vision of our history and future will we build the Europe of tomorrow? Has drug trafficking already changed the nature of our societies? Can we afford to turn away from instances of destabilization in Africa, from the Horn to the Sahel?
Ifri, a foundation recognized as being of public utility, relies largely on private donors – companies and individuals – to guarantee its sustainability and intellectual independence. Through their funding, donors help maintain the Institute's position among the world's leading think tanks. By benefiting from an internationally recognized network and expertise, donors refine their understanding of geopolitical risk and its consequences on global politics and the economy. In 2026, Ifri partners with over 90 French and international companies and organizations.
