Signal Transport electricity demand has been underestimated as electrification outpaced forecasts

Summary

Transport shows the opposite bias to industry in the medium-term sector outlooks. Its average absolute percentage error reaches 18.3 percent, the largest of the three sectors and far above industry at 7.6 percent or buildings at 2.1 percent. The degree of underestimation has grown in the more recent outlooks rather than shrinking. The author attributes this to electric vehicle uptake and transport electrification advancing faster than assumed when the forecasts were made. Existing models appear unable to keep pace with the speed and knock-on effects of electrification in this sector. Transport is thus the sector where structural electrification most visibly widens forecast error.