In this week's episode of Energy Evolution, host Eklavya Gupte takes stock of the EU's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism nearly a year into its definitive phase, and asks a pointed question: Is it working?

To answer it, he is joined by Alwyn Hopkins, director and sustainability leader for Industrials and Energy at EY UK; Dan Maleski, director at the EY Global Tax Center of Excellence; and Irina Breilean, senior carbon price reporter at Platts, part of S&P Global Energy.

Together, they examine how punishing default emissions values are rewriting the economics of steel, fertilizer and other carbon-intensive imports, how traders are building proxy hedges to manage exposure to volatile EU carbon prices, and why 2027 will mark a decisive shift from compliance accounting to live cash flow pressure.

The episode also looks beyond Europe, tracing how CBAM is accelerating the development of carbon pricing regimes from India to Brazil, and what the UK's own version of the mechanism, launching in January 2027, means for global trade flows.

In this week's episode of Energy Evolution, host Camilla Naschert turns the spotlight on Big Tech as part of S&P Global Energy's annual series examining how the world's largest companies are faring on their paths to net-zero emissions.

The AI infrastructure boom has driven the sector's energy appetite to new heights, and its carbon footprint is rising in tandem. Tech reporter Stefan Modrich of S&P Global Market Intelligence surveyed the top 30 IT companies by market cap, tracking targets across scopes 1, 2 and 3. He found genuine ambition sitting uneasily alongside a commercial race to secure power at any cost.

Senior reporter Karin Rives completes the picture from the utility side. Five years into her survey of the 30 largest US electric utilities, she found two-thirds are either not on pace to meet their climate goals, have delayed them or have scrapped them entirely. Some companies cited reliability and affordability as justification, while others are pressing ahead with new gas capacity to keep pace with a surge in electricity demand.

Europe’s increasingly digital power system faces a rapidly evolving mix of cyberattacks, physical sabotage and supply-chain vulnerabilities, with artificial intelligence amplifying both the risks and the defenses.

Host Camilla Naschert speaks with Eurelectric CEO Kristian Ruby and European Initiative for Energy Security Executive Director Albéric Mongrenier about how utilities are responding to AI-enabled threats, state-backed and non-state actors, and attacks on critical infrastructure.

They examine whether Europe’s regulatory framework and security investment are keeping pace, how operators should approach equipment and vendor risk, and why stronger civilian-military coordination will be essential to keep the lights on.