As the world undergoes the green transition, it is expected that demand for electricity will increase as we look to replace fossil fuels as a source of power.
Historically, studies looking to forecast this growth have been made by only looking at changes to the demand side of the equation.
However, in a world looking to achieve net-zero emissions, making such projections now needs to account for the fact that not only is the demand side developing new requirements, but the changing nature of electricity supply also needs to be factored in.
This is already evident in sectors such as those producing hydrogen for industrial purposes, or batteries for cars and other vehicles.
Heating systems for households and the service sector will need to change from fossil-based fuels to electricity-based systems like heat-pumps too.
In Norway, reducing CO2 emissions to fulfil the EU’s “Fit for 55” requirements also means that the electricity supply of all offshore installations will need to be switched from gas-fired plants to an onshore electricity supply.
All main consumption sectors in each country have been estimated individually, but this blog outlines the overall Nordic forecast for each sector, in addition to the total consumption growth for each country.
Our forecasts here are intended to be a “best guess” of how consumption will develop over time, based on a huge number of external sources.
The “Fit for 55” emission target from the EU is not a separate electricity system target – and so our consumption forecast is not be directly connected to this total emission target.
However, we do assume that most of the electricity consumption growth in the Nordpool area has to be covered by new renewable or no-emission production.
Nordic consumption until 2040
Table 1 shows the overall Nordic consumption estimates by sector from EQ.