2025 Energy Market: Between Crises, Tensions and Hopes

2025, a year of energetic chiaroscuro?

Between tariff reforms, geopolitical turbulence, budgetary tensions, the rise of climate scepticism and new energy challenges, the French and global landscape has been profoundly shaken up.

However, behind the crises, hope dominates, with record investment in clean energies, a rise in renewable energies and a revival of nuclear power.

Looking back on a perhaps pivotal year, where the energy transition, put to the test, has shown its resilience.

Electricity and gas markets: a fragile return to balance

Electricity prices: between lull and turbulence

In 2025, the electricity market returned to more moderate price levels, far from the peaks observed in 2022 and 2023.

According to RTE, the average spot price in the first half of the year was around €67/MWh compared to €111/MWh in 2023. However, this level remains “relatively high”, due to the rise in gas prices at the beginning of the year and a severe winter.

But this appeasement should not mask the high market volatility. 

Between negative prices Record high in spring, a summer surge and rapid monthly oscillations, the dynamics remain difficult to predict, due to several factors: the evolution of gas prices, the availability of nuclear power, variations in demand and the level of renewable production.

Gas prices: a gradual decrease to watch

In 2025, the gas market followed a downward trajectory, driven by a relatively abundant supply and the normalization of markets.

After a peak at the beginning of the year, wholesale prices have stabilized in the second half of the year around €30/MWh.

This drop reflects a calming of the markets, thanks to the diversification of supplies, the influx of American LNG, moderate demand and comfortable stocks.

Ceasefire talks between the United States, Ukraine and Russia have also raised hopes for an easing of tensions over Russian gas.

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France: a troubled energy year, between reforms and uncertainties

TURPE 7, Excise, VAT: cascading price increases

The year 2025 did not spare energy bills, with a succession of price increases:

• TURP 7 : the 1^Er February 2025, the Tariff for the use of public electricity networks (TURPE) jumped by 7.7% to finance renewable energies, electric mobility and the adaptation of networks in the face of climate change.
• Despite a slight decrease in the 1^Er In July, its level remains higher than in 2024.
• Excise duty on electricity and gas : at 1^Er In August 2025, the excise on electricity was raised, while the excise on gas fell. Despite opposing developments, they are both reaching a higher price than before the energy crisis. Since 2025, they have also been increased by €4.89/MWh to finance tariff equalisation in Non-Interconnected Areas (ZNI).
• VAT: 2025 marked the end of French specificity with the application of a single VAT rate of 20% on all components of electricity and gas bills.

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The off-peak hours reform

2025 saw the entry into force of the reform of Peak and off-peak hours (HP/HC), which could profoundly change electricity consumption patterns.

Deployed progressively since the 1^Er November and until the end of 2027, this reform aims to rebalancing electricity supply and demand. The objective: to encourage people to shift some of their electricity consumption into the day, when renewable energy production is the most abundant.

In concrete terms, the reform provides for:

• Maintaining at least 5 off-peak hours at night.
• A maximum of 3 off-peak hours during the day, between 11 am and 5 pm.
• A differentiation of off-peak hours according to the seasons.

End of ARENH: a new model under construction

It is one of the major turning points of 2025, last year of application ofARENH, the historic regulatory mechanism for nuclear electricity for alternative suppliers.

Throughout the year, debates crystallized around these successors:

• The UNV (Universal Nuclear Payment) : this new taxation mechanism and redistribution must contain the rise in prices, while securing EDF's income.
• The CAPN (Nuclear Production Allocation Contracts): these long term contracts are designed to guarantee large consumers a secure supply of nuclear electricity at a stable price.

While the main lines of the post-ARENH framework were laid out in 2025, Uncertainty remains on the practical application of UNV and its impact on prices.

Fragile energy governance

While France affirms its ambition to be carbon neutral, 2025 has been punctuated by contradictory signals, fuelled by political tensions, parliamentary instability and budgetary pressure:

• One PEP 3 still waiting : two years late, the Multiannual Energy Programme has still not been published, depriving companies and investors of the visibility they need to get involved.
• Revised public aid : the support systems have been adjusted, between summer break and planing for Ma Prime Rénov', and reorientation of Energy Saving Certificates (EEC).
• Debates around renewable energies : in June 2025, the National Assembly voted for a moratorium on photovoltaic and wind installations, which was finally abandoned at second reading.
• Setbacks in climate-energy policy : the revision of the method of calculating the energy performance diagnosis (DPE) and the adoption of the elimination of Low Emission Zones (EEZs) illustrate the difficulty in reconciling social imperatives and climate objectives.

World: an electric international climate

Energy security under threat

The year 2025 once again demonstrated the precariousness of the geopolitical balance.

While the markets have resisted, caution is still required for the year to come, as energy security remains dependent on areas under tension: the war in Gaza, the 12-day flash clash between Israel and Iran, the difficult transition in Syria, the difficult transition in Syria, the conflict in Ukraine...

Donald Trump and the rise of climate scepticism

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Barely invested in January 2025, the American president continued the pro-fossil decisions : withdrawal of the Paris Agreement, suspension of offshore wind projects, end of aid for electric vehicles, massive support for LNG through commercial blackmail, etc. At the UN desk in September, he described climate change as “biggest scam ever carried out against the world.” 

Donald Trump's positions have Rekindled the climate sceptic flame around the world, uncomplicating speech in the media and on networks.

COP 30, another missed appointment?

Organized in this tense international context, the COP 30 has failed to accelerate climate action. The result of successive compromises, the final agreement remains far below expectations, unsurprisingly for many experts:

• Financing : the text is limited to calling “efforts to at least triple” by 2035, climate adaptation assistance from developing countries, without a numerical commitment from developed countries.
• Exit from fossil fuels : once again, oil and gas producing countries weighed in the negotiations, with a simple discrete reference to the COP 28 compromise in Dubai.
• Deforestation : if COP 30 confirms the creation of the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) fund, the initial ambition is reduced to a simple road map for voluntary countries.

On the sidelines of the agreement, a few advances still deserve to be highlighted:

• The initiative against political disinformation, signed by 19 countries, including France.
• The creation of the Belem Action Mechanism (BAM) to support a just and equitable transition, without worsening social inequalities.

Despite some encouraging signs on adaptation and financing, COP30 once again illustrates the growing gap between the promises made and the geopolitical realities.

2025: the new energy challenges

Iberian blackout: a life-size alert

On April 28, 2025, Spain and Portugal were hit by a massive power outage, unprecedented in Europe. Within a few minutes, the electrical system collapsed. One brutal imbalance between production and consumption has generated cascading surges and the shutdown of infrastructures.

This episode recalls the increasing pressure on electrical networks facing a double transition:

1. Accelerated electrification of uses (electric vehicles, heat pumps, smart building, etc.)
2. The rapid integration of renewable energies.

The Iberian blackout also reveals the fragility of electrical systems and the new ones. challenges in terms of flexibility, storage, and supervision

IA: the new global energy pressure

In 2025, theArtificial intelligence (AI) has made a strong entry into businesses and homes.

This rapid growth leads to a significant increase in electricity consumption to power and cool the data centers that host data and AI models.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that their electricity consumption should double by 2030, representing 3% of global consumption.

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This rise in power of AI and electricity needs, which are often still carbon-based, raises a crucial question: How to reconcile technological progress and ecological sustainability ?

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Reasons for hope: towards a new global energy mix

Massive investments in clean energy

Despite the economic crisis, the IEA estimates that global energy investment should reach $3.3 trillion in 2025, including $2.2 trillion spent on clean technology : renewable energies, nuclear, networks, storage, storage, low-emission fuels, batteries, electric vehicles, energy efficiency and the electrification of uses. China accounts for around a third of global investments.

This figure testifies to thecommitment of businesses and industries who, beyond political tensions, are investing to reduce their emissions, strengthen their energy security and improve their competitiveness.

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ENR and nuclear: the future winning duo in the global mix?

In 2025, France had 95% carbon-free electricity production, thanks to nuclear power and renewable energies. This trend is affirming itself on a global scale, where low-carbon energies are experiencing a real boom.

According to the IEA's mid-year report, renewable production is on the verge of overtaking that of coal. The total share of photovoltaic and wind energy is expected to increase from 15% in 2024 to 17% in 2025 in 2025 in global electricity production, compared to only 4% ten years ago. The think tank Ember confirms this outlook, with a spectacular growth in solar production in the first half of the year.

Based on this provisional report, renewable capacity could exceed the record increase already observed in 2024 by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA).

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In 2025, nuclear power also gained ground in the world. 

A production record has already been announced, with the commissioning of new reactors in China, India and Korea. Global investments could reach $75 billion in 2025.

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To conclude...

2025 will leave the image of a paradoxical and disconcerting year. Shaken by tariff reforms, geopolitical tensions and political debates, she recalled how vulnerable the energy transition is to global shocks.

The faults in the energy system have come to light, revealing the fragility of infrastructures and a strong dependence on international hazards.

But behind these turbulences, the year also revealed strong signals, bringing hope. Investments in low-carbon technologies are reaching unprecedented levels. Renewable energies continue to rise.

Businesses and industries are investing. Despite shocks, uncertainties and oppositions, the energy transition is resisting, adapting and continuing to gain ground.

What if you too chose a more sustainable, more resilient, more human future?

Let's accelerate the energy transition of your company or community together with SirEnergies

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