New technologies

Each one could change the game. We tell you which ones are already real.

16 technologies · updated August 5, 2026

Energy › Mainstream · available now Solar photovoltaics The green technology whose price collapsed fastest. What was once a luxury is now, in many regions, the cheapest electricity available.
Buildings › Mainstream · available now Heat pump It doesn't create heat, it moves it. That's why it delivers several times more heat than the electricity it uses.
Energy › Deployment Battery storage The missing link for solar and wind: keeping electricity for the moment it's actually needed.
Materials › Deployment Low-carbon cement Concrete is the most used material in the world after water. Changing its recipe is one of the least visible and heaviest levers we have.
Water › Deployment Reverse osmosis desalination Pushing seawater through a membrane to strip out the salt. It works, it is deployed, and it discharges more brine than it produces water.
Transport › Deployment Sustainable aviation fuels Jet fuel made from residues rather than petroleum. It exists, it flies, and it fills under 1% of the tanks.
Transport › Deployment Sodium-ion batteries A battery made from sodium, salt, instead of lithium. It exists and it drives, but its future depends on the price of lithium more than on its own progress.
Waste › Deployment Anaerobic digestion of organic waste Letting bacteria digest organic waste to draw gas from it. The potential is worth a quarter of world gas; reality covers a thousandth of it.
Water › Deployment Water network leak detection Listening to pipes to find leaks without digging. The technology has existed for a long time, and networks still leak just as much.
Buildings › Deployment Cross-laminated timber Gluing boards in crossed layers to make load-bearing panels that replace concrete and steel. The building then stores carbon instead of emitting it.
Energy › Prototype Direct air capture Sucking CO₂ straight out of ambient air. The technology works, it's the scale that's the problem.
Food › Prototype Green ammonia Making nitrogen fertiliser without fossil gas. Half of humanity eats thanks to this fertiliser, and today it is made from natural gas.
Materials › Prototype Low-carbon steel Replacing coal with hydrogen to turn ore into iron. The demonstration is done, the price is not following.
Food › Prototype Precision fermentation Getting micro-organisms to produce proteins identical to those in milk or eggs. Without animals, but not without farming.
Waste › Prototype Chemical recycling of plastics Breaking plastic back into molecules to make it new again. The process works, it's the plants that keep closing.
Energy › Laboratory Nuclear fusion The energy of the stars, reproduced in a lab. A genuine scientific achievement, and not one watt delivered to a grid so far.

Myth and reality

Received idea

"Nuclear fusion is about to solve the climate problem."

What the sources say

Ignition has indeed been achieved in the lab, eleven times according to LLNL, with a record 8.6 megajoules and a gain above 4 in April 2025. But no facility delivers electricity to a grid, experiments last a fraction of a second, and the timelines discussed run into decades. The decisions that matter for 2030 and 2050 are made with technologies already available.

LLNL - Achieving Fusion Ignition ↗

Received idea

"Carbon capture will let us carry on as before."

What the sources say

About 36 direct air capture plants were operating worldwide in early 2025. At its nameplate capacity of 36,000 tonnes a year, the largest would offset roughly 30 seconds of global emissions, against the 38.1 billion tonnes of fossil CO₂ emitted in 2025. In practice it captured only 105 tonnes over its first ten months of operation, less than a tenth of a second. Capture is a useful complement for unavoidable emissions, not a licence to carry on.

Heimildin + WRI + Global Carbon Budget 2025 ↗

Received idea

"Making an electric car's battery pollutes more than a petrol car's entire life."

What the sources say

Making an electric vehicle does emit more, about 40% more according to the ICCT, because of the battery. But that gap is paid back after roughly 17,000 km, one to two years of driving. Across the full life cycle, the ICCT estimates a car registered in the European Union in 2025 emits about 73% less than a petrol car, calculated on the European electricity mix projected over the vehicle's lifetime. With fully renewable electricity, the gap widens to 78%.

ICCT - Analyse du cycle de vie (juillet 2025) ↗

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