Future growth of Finnish industrial electricity demand

Determine whether Finnish industrial electricity demand can be expected to double between 2025 and 2050, as projected by the Nordic Grid Development Perspective 2025 rather than by the PyPSA-Eur demand pathway.

Background

The paper finds a pronounced disagreement between the NGDP and PyPSA-Eur regarding industrial electricity demand in Finland. The NGDP projects an increase from 40 TWh in 2025 to 96 TWh in 2050, while the PyPSA-Eur pathway increases demand from approximately 38.91 TWh to 53.08 TWh.

The authors explicitly leave unresolved whether the scale of industrial growth assumed by the NGDP is realistic. This uncertainty affects projected electricity balances, net exports, generation expansion, and the anticipated role of hydrogen in Finland’s energy transition.

References

Whether a doubling of the industry demand can be expected in Finland, this is up to debate.

— Modelling the Nordic power system expansion with PyPSA-Eur: a comparison with the Nordic Grid Development Perspective 2025  (2610.13167 - Gorjão et al., 9 Oct 2026) in Section 4, Results and discussion