1st Quarter , 21st Century: We Changed the World!
Wishing everyone a very happy 2026 and the second quarter of this century!
The year 2025 marks not just the end of another year, but the completion of the first quarter of the 21st century. This quarter-century has been one of unprecedented transformation—geopolitically, technologically, economically, and socially.
All of us who have worked professionally in rapidly evolving domains can legitimately say that we have changed the world. These domains include telephony, the internet, information technology, energy, engineering, space, medicine, and education, among others.
Technological Developments
Renewable Energy in India
On the technological front—beyond the natural pace of innovation—this quarter-century has witnessed a remarkable expansion of renewable energy, particularly wind and solar.
At the beginning of the century (around 2001), India’s total installed wind power capacity was approximately 1 GW. Today, it stands at about 54 GW—a nearly 50-fold increase in 25 years, or roughly 2 GW per year. Similarly, almost the entire 133 GW of solar power capacity existing today has been installed during this period.
In effect, 254 GW of renewable energy capacity has been added to India’s power generation system in just 25 years.
Until around 2012, renewable energy—especially wind—was still considered a struggling technology. I vividly recall a conference where someone remarked that I spoke too much about wind energy, asserting that “wind cannot be a solution.” At that time, the mainstream energy sector was beginning to feel uncomfortable with the rise of renewables.
Today, with scale, market depth, and robust policy and institutional frameworks in place, renewable energy has become a juggernaut—a force that will not stop.
Electric Mobility and Renewable Integration
Another major transformation has occurred in the transportation sector, with increasing electrification.
According to PIB, as of November 2025, about 812 MW of solar power and 93 MW of wind power have been commissioned specifically to meet the traction requirements of Indian Railways. Additionally, 100 MW of renewable power under Round-the-Clock (RTC) mode, tied up through the Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI), is now supplying traction energy.
Beyond railways, India has nearly 6 million electric vehicles on its roads, drawing power largely from the grid—where renewable energy increasingly plays a significant role.
The potential for renewable energy remains immense. In 2011, I assessed and published a wind energy potential of about 2,000 GW, based on then-prevailing technologies (2 MW turbines with 80 m hub heights). Today, turbines exceeding 5 MW with 140 m hub heights are being deployed, dramatically improving plant load factors and land-use efficiency.
For solar energy, earlier assessments placed the potential at around 11,000 GW. With newer technologies, this figure could easily reach 15,000 GW. It is therefore very likely that the next quarter-century (2025–2050) will witness massive renewable energy installations.
That said, some areas remain underexploited—most notably offshore wind energy and small wind turbines.
Renewable Energy Worldwide
Globally, in 2000, total installed wind power capacity stood at 17.4 GW, while solar power was a modest 1.22 GW.
By 2025, global wind power capacity has reached approximately 1,320 GW, and solar power has crossed 2,000 GW, taking combined wind and solar installations to over 3,320 GW. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), total global renewable capacity—including hydro—is expected to reach 5,800 GW.
In simple terms, almost the entire global wind and solar capacity has been installed in just 25 years.
Notably, India and China have led these installations, signalling a clear eastward shift in renewable energy markets. Technological progress has been especially striking in wind energy, where turbine capacities have increased more than fivefold, and hub heights have nearly doubled.
Mobile Phones and the Internet Revolution
Another defining change of this era has been the near-universal penetration of mobile phones.
Today, there are more mobile subscriptions than people worldwide. More than half of these devices are smartphones, providing access to the internet, apps, and digital services that have transformed daily life.
Banking, sourcing, supply chains, shopping, and communication have all been revolutionized. International meetings now happen instantly through platforms like Zoom, MS Teams, and Google Meet.
During the COVID period, we successfully organized the WWEC 2021 international conference virtually, in partnership with TERI, with participation from eminent global experts and even Ministers. What once seemed extraordinary has now become routine—yet it remains one of the most dramatic changes in how we work.
COVID-19: A Global Disruption
Beginning in 2020, the world faced the unprecedented shock of COVID-19 and global shutdowns. The result was the rapid normalization of work from home, virtual collaboration, and home-delivery systems. Many organizations across the world continue to embrace these models today.
Space Technology
India gained global recognition through the Chandrayaan missions and the Mars Orbiter Mission. ISRO has also emerged as a reliable partner for launching satellites for other nations.
Globally, space exploration expanded dramatically—missions reached asteroid Bennu, private companies like SpaceXintroduced disruptive technologies, and countries such as India, China, Japan, Europe, and the UAE joined the space race.
India’s successful Moon landing surprised many, challenging the long-held assumption that only the US, China, or Russia could achieve such feats. Chandrayaan did more than touch the Moon—it boosted global respect for Indian technology.
In the previous quarter-century (1975–2000), we watched the Moon from a distance. In this quarter, we touched it.
I recall a conversation in 2005 in Bonn, during the European Parliamentary Forum organized by Dr. Hermann Scheer, with Dr. Aloys Wobben of Enercon Gmbh, who remarked that Indians would soon think of going to the Moon. My response was simple: “Why not?”
Social, Environmental, and Geopolitical Realities
Despite remarkable technological progress and growing awareness, the period 2000–2025 has also exposed the limits of global coordination in addressing shared challenges. While renewable energy, digitalization, and efficiency improvements have advanced rapidly, global greenhouse gas emissions—particularly CO₂, CH₄, and N₂O—have continued to rise or remain stubbornly high.
Electricity generation and transportation remain among the most significant contributors to emissions. The expansion of renewable energy, electrification of transport, energy efficiency measures, and innovations such as aerofoil-based sails in shipping offer clear pathways for mitigation. However, the pace of deployment has often been outmatched by rising energy demand driven by population growth, urbanization, and economic expansion.
Beyond technology, social and geopolitical factors have played a decisive role in shaping environmental outcomes. Since around 2021, the world has witnessed a resurgence of geopolitical tensions, wars, and regional conflicts. It is important that such situations are contained, de-escalated or resolved without resorting to wars. When conflicts persist or escalate, their consequences extend far beyond immediate humanitarian and security concerns, affecting energy systems, supply chains, environmental degradation, and long-term sustainability priorities.
Wars and military activities are highly carbon- and resource-intensive, involving large-scale fuel consumption, destruction of infrastructure, ecosystem damage, and post-conflict reconstruction. Yet, emissions from military operations remain largely untracked, underreported, and excluded from most national and international climate accounting frameworks. In times of conflict, environmental priorities are inevitably sidelined, even though the long-term ecological costs are immense.
At the social level, this quarter-century has also seen growing inequality, displacement, and polarization, both within and between nations. Climate change impacts—such as extreme weather events, water stress, and food insecurity—disproportionately affect vulnerable populations, often exacerbating existing social and political tensions. In this sense, environmental stress is increasingly both a cause and a consequence of geopolitical instability.
Yet, there are also positive signals. Public awareness of climate and sustainability issues is higher than ever. Civil society, industry, cities, and sub-national actors have increasingly stepped in where global consensus has been slow. The energy transition, while uneven, is no longer a fringe agenda—it is firmly embedded in mainstream economic and strategic thinking.
Ultimately, the experience of 2000–2025 underscores a central lesson: technology alone is not enough. Sustainable progress requires stable geopolitics, inclusive growth, effective institutions, and long-term leadership. Without these, even the most promising technological solutions risk being diluted or delayed.
Economic Shift
The period 2000–2025 has witnessed a profound rebalancing of global economic power, marked by the rise of Asia as a central driver of global growth. China and India, in particular, have emerged as major economic and technological players, complemented by established and emerging economies such as Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam.
This shift has been underpinned by several structural factors: demographic scale, urbanization, manufacturing depth, expanding domestic markets, improvements in education and skills, and large-scale investments in infrastructure, energy, and digital connectivity. Asia has become not only a manufacturing hub but increasingly a center for innovation, consumption, and capital formation.
Global supply chains have been significantly reconfigured during this period. While earlier decades were dominated by a largely West-centric economic model, the current quarter-century has seen production, value addition, and technological capability move steadily eastward. At the same time, Asia’s integration into the global economy has been deep, complex, and mutually interdependent rather than isolated.
For India and China, this rise has also brought greater geopolitical visibility and responsibility. Economic strength has translated into a stronger voice in global institutions, trade negotiations, climate discussions, and technology standards. Yet this shift has not been linear or frictionless. It has generated competition, strategic realignments, and periodic tensions with established Western powers.
Importantly, the relationship between Asia and the West during this period has been characterized by both rivalry and collaboration. Large-scale investments, technology transfers, research partnerships, and financial flows continue in both directions. Global challenges—such as climate change, pandemics, financial stability, and energy security—have reinforced the reality that economic competition coexists with deep interdependence.
Looking ahead, this economic rebalancing is likely to continue into the next quarter-century. The key question will not be whether Asia remains central to global growth, but how this multipolar economic order is managed—and whether cooperation, rules-based engagement, and shared responsibility can keep pace with shifting power dynamics.
Artificial Intelligence
Finally, Artificial Intelligence (AI)—which has seen rapid and visible deployment over the last two to three years—is once again transforming how humans work, learn, design, analyze, and decide. While AI has existed conceptually and academically for decades, advances in computing power, data availability, algorithms, and cloud infrastructure have enabled it to move from laboratories into everyday professional and personal life.
AI is already reshaping knowledge work—from drafting documents and analyzing large datasets to coding, design optimization, diagnostics, forecasting, and decision support. In sectors such as energy, transportation, healthcare, finance, education, and governance, AI is being increasingly used to improve efficiency, reduce costs, enhance predictive capabilities, and manage complex systems at scales that were previously unthinkable.
In the context of energy and climate, AI holds particular promise. It can help optimize grid operations, forecast renewable generation, manage storage and demand response, improve resource assessment, and accelerate research and development cycles. Properly applied, AI can become a powerful enabler of the energy transition rather than just another consumer of energy.
At the same time, AI raises fundamental questions—about employment, skill displacement, data ownership, bias, misinformation, concentration of power, and ethical governance. Like all transformative technologies, AI is value-neutral; its societal impact will depend on how thoughtfully and responsibly it is deployed.
What is clear, however, is that AI represents another inflection point—comparable in significance to the internet or mobile communications. It is a tool of immense capability now placed in human hands. Whether it amplifies human creativity and problem-solving or deepens existing inequalities will depend on policy choices, institutional frameworks, and collective wisdom.
As we enter the next quarter-century, AI is likely to become not just a tool we use, but a co-pilot in many aspects of human endeavor—reshaping work, governance, and innovation in ways we are only beginning to understand.
Closing Thought
Looking back, it is clear that 2000–2025 was not just a period of change—it was a period of transformation. As professionals and participants in this era, we did not merely witness history; we shaped it.
A Personal Reflection on These 25 Years
Looking back over this quarter-century, these 25 years have been particularly action-packed for me, unfolding in parallel with major technological transformations and the global energy transition. One of the most striking shifts I witnessed firsthand was wind power’s evolution—from a marginal and often-dismissed idea into a mainstream and globally accepted energy solution.
Much of my professional engagement lay at the interphase of policy, technology, and entrepreneurship. A significant portion of this journey involved foundational and mentoring work, particularly around business insights and analytical capability-building. Over the years, I became involved in a wide spectrum of wind-related initiatives spanning manufacturing, consulting, project development, and private-equity–led Independent Power Producer (IPP) roles. My analytical and consulting footprint expanded well beyond India, extending to countries such as Mauritius, Malaysia, Kenya, Yemen, Algeria, Bangladesh, Cambodia, and Bhutan.
I also represented industry stakeholders across multiple platforms, including the Indian Wind Energy Association, the Indian Wind Power Association, and the World Wind Energy Association (WWEA). In these roles, I contributed to broader sectoral initiatives, including early efforts related to offshore wind development.
Alongside industry engagement, I maintained a strong connection with analytical and academic work. This included the assessment of India’s wind power potential in 2011 and 2015, as well as supporting the National Institute of Wind Energy (NIWE) in developing its own national wind potential estimation framework. More recently, my intellectual curiosity expanded into cosmology, where I proposed the concept of the Effective Age of the Universe (EAoU)—a framework that, to some extent, helps address what is commonly referred to as cosmological tension. In a related line of inquiry at the interface of philosophy and physics, I highlighted cognizance as a fundamental and often-overlooked component of the measurement process itself. Several papers on cosmology have been published over the past three years.
On the international front, I served as the International Programme Coordinator for WWEC 2006—the largest wind energy conference ever held in India—and later for WWEC 2021, which was conducted virtually during the COVID period. In 2017, at Malmö, I was elected Vice President and Technical Chair of the World Wind Energy Association, and subsequently have served as its Honorary Vice President till date.
Jami Hossain