The worldwide power panorama is continually evolving with one factor remaining fixed: the demand for power, whatever the kind, continues to extend. There are 8.2 billion folks on the planet in the present day who all want entry to inexpensive, sustainable, and safe power. International power demand is projected to develop between 11% and 18% by 2050,1 and assembly this rising demand would require innovation from each a part of the power sector worth chain.
As we witnessed in lots of management dialogues at CERAWeek 2025, AI adoption is happening at an accelerated velocity within the power sector. The position of AI in assembly rising power demand is multifaceted and transformative. AI can optimize operations, scale back power consumption, improve grid capability and reliability, and assist renewable power integration. It may well additionally tackle power safety and sustainability efforts, corresponding to carbon seize and storage, and methane administration and mitigation. AI’s potential within the power sector is powerful. Critically, all these improvements are underpinned by the {industry}’s collective aim to mitigate environmental influence and proceed to maneuver in the direction of a extra sustainable future, whereas assembly the rising demand for power.
Microsoft is dedicated to serving to to drive progress within the power {industry} by way of technological innovation—working to empower the power workforce, optimize operational effectivity and security, advance internet zero commitments, and develop sustainable, AI-powered companies.
CERAWeek 2025 takeaways
In March 2025, we attended CERAWeek 2025some of the influential power gatherings of the 12 months, which offers a platform for over 8,000 attendees to attach, share and talk about insights, and discover the place the {industry} is headed.
This 12 months, just a few key takeaways from the occasion have been:
AI is altering the sport throughout industries, and power isn’t any exception.
Jason Zander, Government Vice President for Strategic Missions and Applied sciences at Microsoft, spoke within the session “Will AI Revolutionize the Power Sector?” and mentioned the methods wherein AI is remodeling the power sector with revolutionary options that enhance power effectivity, optimize manufacturing, and combine renewable sources. One of many latest breakthroughs that Jason highlighted is Microsoft’s Majorana 1the world’s first Quantum Processing Unit (QPU) powered by a Topological Core, designed to scale to one million qubits on a single chip. This development has sensible functions to assist resolve a few of the most tough international challenges. It brings the potential to revolutionize the power {industry} with prospects corresponding to growing self-healing supplies, enhancing security, creating catalysts to interrupt down plastics, and considerably advancing sustainability by way of extra recyclable and reusable supplies.
Highly effective collaboration with industry-leading, strategic companions is essential to development and innovation.
A number of of our companions; Accenture, Cognite, Honeywell, Kongsberg Digital, Schneider Electrical, and SLB showcased their industry-leading, real-world options within the Microsoft sales space. These revolutionary AI-powered options illustrate the immense alternative to remodel the power {industry} and empower the power workforce with fashionable expertise.
One standout demo was Schneider Electrical’s new One Digital Grid Platforman AI-powered system that helps enhance the reliability and effectivity of energy grids. Utilizing Microsoft Azurethis platform permits totally different software program options to work collectively, serving to utilities modernize their grids and supply cleaner, extra inexpensive power at a decrease total price. Schneider Electrical is leveraging Microsoft options to enhance grid reliabilityand is collaborating with Itron to take action. Options like these, constructed with strategic companions, tackle the necessity for a contemporary, digital grid to offer power to all who want it.
Rework and optimize resilient power techniques with AI
AI’s potential within the power {industry} is transformative, with the potential to optimize operations, strengthen safety, and advance decarbonization. To offer the power that the world would require, the power {industry} wants clever options that tackle these wants with sooner insights and elevated productiveness.
The influence of AI options is straight correlated to the quantity of information corporations have at their disposal. For power corporations that will have a fractured information property spanning numerous environments and proprietary information codecs, establishing a unified information basis is a tough activity. This is the reason Microsoft is dedicated to equipping {industry} leaders with highly effective, enterprise platforms just like the Microsoft Cloud to speed up this transformation. And with Microsoft Material, information, AI, safety, and functions are built-in to allow real-time information processing and AI-powered insights in order that corporations could make knowledgeable choices extra shortly. Microsoft Azure Knowledge Supervisor for Power can also be an vital piece of this power information journey, and important to carbon storage and planning. Most powerfully, it could create a repository for all of a company’s information in a single location. Moreover, by adopting our adaptive cloud strategy and unifying siloed groups, distributed websites, and sprawling techniques right into a single operation, organizations can enhance safety, enhance information modeling, and leverage cloud-native and AI applied sciences throughout hybrid, multicloud, edge, and Web of Issues (IoT) environments.
From there, customized experiences and insights might be generated with Microsoft 365 Copilot. These cutting-edge options are designed to assist power corporations harness the complete potential of their information with AI—enabling seamless integration, real-time insights, and predictive analytics to assist drive effectivity and innovation throughout the sector.
One huge alternative for the power sector relating to utilizing AI is its energy to assist decarbonize the power worth chain. It’s clear that decarbonization is a essential step in the direction of reaching a sustainable and net-zero future—involving decreasing carbon emissions throughout all phases of power manufacturing, distribution, and consumption. By integrating renewable power sources and bettering power effectivity by way of adopting revolutionary applied sciences like AI, the power sector has the potential to considerably decrease its carbon footprint extra shortly than was doable with out the effectivity beneficial properties from AI. The latest Worldwide Power Company report, “Power and AI” shares a number of potential examples of price and power financial savings in energy plant operations and end-use sectors, corresponding to manufacturing and transportation. For instance, AI in transportation can improve car operation and administration, probably reducing power consumption—and subsequently emissions—as much as 20%.2
AI’s potential in enhancing safety is immense, providing each huge implications and alternatives. Utilizing AI to boost safety is already making a distinction for corporations, with a latest examine of Copilot customers displaying that utilizing Microsoft Safety Copilot lowered imply time to decision by 30%.3 Harnessing the ability of AI to bolster safety within the power {industry}, we just lately launched six new Microsoft Safety Copilot brokers. These brokers symbolize the ability of AI to reply to an more and more excessive quantity of safety threats that power organizations face in the present day. They’re designed to autonomously handle high-volume safety duties, serving to to offer sturdy safety for essential power infrastructure. By leveraging superior risk intelligence and machine studying, these brokers can swiftly detect, examine, and reply to safety incidents, serving to to mitigate dangers related to cyberattacks.
Demonstrating the ability of collaboration in AI innovation, new partner-developed brokers will even be out there in Safety Copilot. These options supply industry-specific options, corresponding to the power to grasp sector-specific compliance wants. This strategy enhances operational effectivity and can assist to strengthen the general safety posture for power corporations that undertake brokers, permitting IT and operations groups to deal with their core operations whereas sustaining a resilient protection towards ever-evolving threats.
Our clients like Chevron are additionally already seeing the influence of AI of their operations, integrating real-time information from IoT units, optimizing tools and bandwidth prices, and accelerating decision-making with AI on the edge.
Collaborating with Chevron on amenities of the longer term with Azure IoT Operations
With its Services and Operations of the Future initiative, Chevron is reimagining the monitoring of its bodily operations to assist distant and autonomous operations by way of enhanced capabilities and real-time entry to information. This contains ongoing efforts to make use of expertise to unlock entry to linked information throughout an unlimited community of IoT units—in the end for larger velocity to choices. Chevron labored carefully with Microsoft to deploy Azure IoT Operationsenabled by Azure Arc. This edge-to-cloud information airplane facilitates information seize from varied units like Wi-Fi cameras, thermal cameras, sensors, robots, and drones on the edge earlier than sending it to the cloud. Chevron selected Azure for its versatile infrastructure to manage information and scale globally, unifying websites and techniques into one AI-assisted management pane. Utilizing AI on the edge, the place sensors are situated on the tools, helps optimize tools and bandwidth prices and accelerates velocity to insights.
Study extra about power and sources options with Microsoft
As we glance to the longer term, AI is changing into an more and more vital drive within the power {industry}—enabling corporations to attain larger security and effectivity, assist safe their operations, and enhance sustainability. Key to this development and innovation is highly effective collaboration with our strategic companions and safe, resilient options that meet the {industry}’s sturdy wants. Microsoft stays devoted to supporting this journey, offering the instruments and applied sciences wanted to thrive in an ever-evolving power panorama.
Microsoft for power and sources
Drive innovation to attain internet zero
1 International Power Perspective 2024, McKinsey, September 2024.
2 Power and AI, AI for power optimization and innovation.
3 Agentic AI and Microsoft Safety Copilot: Revolutionizing cybersecurity, March 2025.
