Shiloh Fetzek
The energy transition is reshaping the modern battlefield and geostrategic competition. A growing number of countries – primarily Western states and their allies – have committed to reducing defence greenhouse-gas emissions to net zero by mid-century. This paper compares how countries and alliances plan to address the technical and political complexities of radical defence decarbonisation, suggesting ways to catalyse research and development and address the challenges around defence priorities and resourcing in a changing climate and strategic environment.The energy transition is reshaping the modern battlefield and geostrategic competition, and it is increasingly clear that energy independence and diversification of supply will confer strategic advantage. Defence innovation is moving in this direction, spurred by a growing number of countries – primarily Western states and their allies – committing to reducing defence greenhouse-gas emissions to net zero by mid-century. Achieving this target will be a significant technical, cultural and political challenge. This paper compares how countries plan to address the complexities of the defence energy transition.
Militaries facing the decarbonisation challenge are adopting a common approach – implementing available technologies and practices for emissions reductions while building the technical and institutional capacity to rapidly accelerate innovation and implementation in the medium term. High-emitting platforms have long development and procurement timelines and are in service for decades, meaning that major technological advancements must be achieved soon for militaries to reduce their emissions to a level that they could offset to reach net zero by mid-century. Realising such advancements will require changes to business-as-usual procurement and new ways of working with civilian partners – including government departments (such as energy, trade and transportation), commercial aviation and shipping, and newcomers working on breakthrough technologies – to accelerate energy technology development and uptake.
The United Kingdom is at the forefront of efforts to advance this agenda, through a range of innovative policy and partnership arrangements. France is also a significant contributor, while the United States has made net-zero commitments under the current administration that add momentum to its considerable defence-innovation capacities. Countries including Australia, Canada, the Netherlands and New Zealand are leveraging domestic innovation and strengthening partnerships for technology-sharing, while NATO and the European Union are catalysing these processes by combining allies’ efforts to overcome technological and institutional hurdles, in part to preserve interoperability. Other countries, including China, India and Japan, are developing and trialling lower-emissions technologies but have not committed to phasing out conventionally powered forces.
There are many open questions around the implementation and implications of the defence energy transition. For the highest-emitting sectors that are most difficult to mitigate, namely air and maritime fuels, the pace of the transition will be determined by how possible it is to develop lower-emissions fuels and how quickly they can be scaled. In taking on the decarbonisation agenda, defence will be competing with other users of critical minerals and materials like steel, aluminium and copper that will be in high demand as energy systems transition. Achieving defence net zero will require maintaining the political will to invest in research and development for breakthrough technologies, much of which will most likely emerge in the considerably larger civilian commercial sector, and be adopted or adapted to the defence sector’s energy needs.
Defence will need to navigate interlinked technical and political challenges related to the pace of change in a significantly evolving strategic environment; timing the energy transition to optimise military effectiveness; managing the broader strategic implications of rapidly evolving weapons technologies, operating concepts and force structures; successfully negotiating resource allocation; and addressing the nature of security and defence priorities in a climate-changed future.
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