¶ Scenario 3: Energy and Climate -- Technology Instead of Austerity

Forecast: AI-optimised fusion reactors and direct carbon removal from the atmosphere will solve the CO2 problem. The traditional environmental movement, which relies on austerity, will become politically irrelevant.

¶ The Energy Bottleneck

The AI revolution consumes energy on a scale that surprises even experts. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates global electricity consumption by data centres in 2024 at around 415 terawatt-hours -- approximately 1.5 per cent of worldwide electricity consumption [1]. By 2030, this figure is expected to more than double to over 945 TWh -- equivalent to the entire electricity consumption of Japan.

A single training run of a large language model like GPT-4 consumes as much electricity as 10,000 Swiss households in a year [2]. And that is just the training. Ongoing operation -- billions of queries per day -- comes on top.

¶ Nuclear Fusion Is Getting Closer

Nuclear fusion, for decades "thirty years away", is coming within reach through AI-assisted plasma control. The computing power for simulating fusion plasma, which in 2010 would have required decades, has been reduced to months by AI.

Key players:

• ITER (France): In which Switzerland participates, expected to generate first net energy in the 2030s [3].
• Commonwealth Fusion Systems: Working with AI-optimised high-temperature superconductors.
• Helion Energy: Sam Altman (CEO OpenAI) has personally invested billions [4].

Forecast: The probability that nuclear fusion will be commercially usable by 2050 exceeds 70 per cent. When fusion arrives, energy scarcity becomes a memory, not a problem.

¶ AI-Optimised Renewable Energy

In parallel with fusion, AI is dramatically improving the efficiency of existing solar and wind installations:

• Precise weather forecasting for optimal feed-in planning
• Intelligent grid management for real-time load balancing
• Dynamic load control to avoid peak loads

¶ CO2 Removal Instead of Austerity

Scenario: Instead of solving the CO2 problem exclusively through consumption reduction, AI-controlled direct carbon removal from the atmosphere (Direct Air Capture) becomes economically viable [5]. AI-controlled agriculture -- swarms of small robots tending fields plant by plant -- eliminates pesticides and herbicides. What is organic luxury today becomes the standard supply.

¶ The Swiss Position

Switzerland generates around 60 per cent of its electricity from hydropower and decided by popular vote in 2017 against new nuclear power plants. For a country that wants to be an AI hub, this is an uncomfortable truth: whoever lacks energy will become a spectator to a revolution happening elsewhere.

Microsoft has announced plans to bring decommissioned nuclear power plants back online. Google and Amazon are investing in small modular reactors [6]. The message is unmistakable: Whoever wants to control the future of AI must first solve the energy question.

The dominant political narrative of the 2020s -- climate emergency and economic restrictions -- will be overtaken by technological progress. This is politically explosive but historically consistent: technology has always solved scarcity problems more reliably than appeals to austerity.

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¶ Bibliography

[1] International Energy Agency (IEA): Electricity Mid-Year Update 2025. Paris, 2025.

[2] S&P Global: Data Center Power Demand. 2025.

[3] ITER Organization: ITER -- the way to new energy. iter.org, 2025.

[4] Helion Energy: Company Profile and Investors. helionenergy.com, 2024.

[5] Climeworks AG: Direct Air Capture Technology. Zurich (Swiss company, world leader).

[6] Microsoft: Announcement on Three Mile Island Reactivation. September 2024.