2026

AI data centres are generating their own power. How does that affect the wider grid?

AI data centres are generating their own power. How does that affect the wider grid?

By Piyush Verma

The grid is more than a machine for moving electrons. It is a shared system of costs, responsibilities and reliability. As AI campuses bring their own power, the question is not whether they are on or off the grid, but what they owe it when they still depend on it.

Agentic AI and India: Implications for Security, Governance, and International Partnerships

Agentic AI and India: Implications for Security, Governance, and International Partnerships

Edited Volume

By Soumya Awasthi, Ishita Deshmukh, Sameer Patil, Kavya Wadhwa, Purushraj Patnaik, Pranoy Jainendran, Sameer Patil, Rahul Rawat, Debjyoti Chakravorty, Basu Chandola, and Tanusha Tyagi

Editor: Dhruva Jaishankar

Asia beyond buffers: the second-generation resilience agenda

Asia beyond buffers: the second-generation resilience agenda

By Udaibir Das

Policy-makers cannot prevent every shock, but they can influence how prepared the economy is to deal with them, by reducing exposures, protecting essential functions and preserving policy room. Asia built its first generation of financial defenses after a crisis. It should build the second before the next.

Raising ambition in the India-New Zealand partnership

Raising ambition in the India-New Zealand partnership

By Dhruva Jaishankar

The India-New Zealand partnership has benefited in recent years from top-down political attention, a strong people-to-people foundation, and external impulses compelling both New Delhi and Wellington to diversify their partnerships. The next few years represent an opportunity to build upon the foundations of an FTA and Strategic Partnership and construct a relationship that is more than two-dimensional.  

Net Zero Planning Needs an AI Update. COP31 is the Right Moment to Do That

Net Zero Planning Needs an AI Update. COP31 is the Right Moment to Do That

By Piyush Verma and Andrei Covatariu

The COP31 presidency has proposed raising electricity’s share of global final energy demand, yet AI is largely missing from climate and energy planning. At COP31 in Antalya this November, that needs to change.

ORF Global Quarterly: Energy and Tech: Powering the Future

ORF Global Quarterly: Energy and Tech: Powering the Future

Edited Volume

By Andreas Kuehn, Cauvery Ganapathy, Piyush Verma, Parul Bakshi, Lydia Powell, Gopalika Arora, Siddharth Yadav, Amoha Basrur, Pranoy Jainendran, Prateek Tripathi, and Sauradeep Bag

Editors: Sharon Stirling and Eszter Karacsony

India and Taiwan’s Evolving Entente Commerciale: Trade and Informal Defense Cooperation Between Taiwan-India

India and Taiwan’s Evolving Entente Commerciale: Trade and Informal Defense Cooperation Between Taiwan-India

By Benjamin Tkach and Vasabjit Banerjee

We evaluate cooperative steps that both India and Taiwan have taken in the defense arena, demonstrating how mutual antagonist China, economic ties, and budding security coordination are creating an entente.

India’s Defence Export Rise Opens a Door for Australia

India’s Defence Export Rise Opens a Door for Australia

By Dhruva Jaishankar

The new joint defense declaration between India and Australia articulated a more ambitious objective of defense industrial cooperation, including to “develop arrangements for advanced defense science and technology collaboration.” This may appear challenging, but India has made remarkable developments in its defense industrial capabilities over the past five years. These offer little-appreciated opportunities for many of its partners, including Australia.

Beyond the NZ-India Free Trade Agreement: What Comes Next?

Beyond the NZ-India Free Trade Agreement: What Comes Next?

By Dhruva Jaishankar

A world in which freedom of navigation or energy supplies can be imperiled by the actions of others will require more international partnerships. A consolidation of relations between the governments of India and New Zealand makes eminent sense in this context. While an FTA is a welcome development, it remains just one step toward what can be a much more broad-based and mutually-beneficial partnership.

The Energy Sector is AI's Natural Home. Right Now, it's Fumbling That Edge

The Energy Sector is AI's Natural Home. Right Now, it's Fumbling That Edge

By Piyush Verma and Andrei Covatariu

Much of the conversation in Geneva rightly focused on managing AI's growing energy demand. That work is essential, but it is only half the story. The larger opportunity lies in how AI can reduce energy use across industry, buildings, transport and power systems, while enabling greater integration of renewable energy.

Port of Hope

Port of Hope

By Vasabjit Banerjee

China evidently recognises the Calcutta Port System as an economic force multiplier for India’s economic power in the region. The Indian government has recently advanced several solutions, from modernisation to expansion of the port system. Yet, more needs to be done by the Indian government and private investors to strengthen the port system to ward off Chinese influence.