Insights

Key Insights from the RWN Executive Briefing: 12 May 2026 

The RWN Executive Briefing, hosted by the Resilience World Nexus (RWN) Summit and WPC Energy, with the support of Petroleum Economist, brought together senior practitioners to provide cross-sector perspectives on energy security, operational resilience, and market risk.

The energy sector is facing a time of great uncertainty, shaped by the convergence of geopolitical conflict, volatile commodity markets, the accelerating pressures of the energy transition, and the growing physical threat of climate change to the very infrastructure the global energy system depends on. While we have to accept the complexity of the situation, we must also understand that this is a real opportunity for innovation, collaboration, and long-term resilience strategies. Leaders need to take responsibility and harness the ‘closing window of opportunity’ now more than ever, before the opportunities narrow further. 

The Current Landscape 

The ongoing conflict in the Middle East has sent shockwaves through global energy markets, with traffic through the Strait of Hormuz falling sharply as regional tensions have forced shipping companies to reroute and extend transit times. Far from a regional issue, this reflects a global systemic shock – a reminder that a single chokepoint can disrupt an entire global economy, and that the most destabilising variable to world trade is not reduced supply but the loss of predictability. The effects will persist for months if not years, making the shift from reactive to proactive resilience not a choice but a necessity. Meanwhile, while financial markets have bounced to near all-time highs on the back of the AI boom, rising energy costs, raw material prices, and logistics pressures are feeding through to corporate cost bases and consumers – and the market's apparent confidence is masking a far more troubling picture underneath. 

Rebuilding the Global Supply Chain 

Conflicts like the one in the Middle East will continue to ripple through global supply chains until organisations address a critical visibility gap. As highlighted by Ms. Catherine Cyphus, approximately 80% of supply chain disruption risk resides within Tier 2 and Tier 3 suppliers, despite fewer than 10% of organisations maintaining meaningful visibility into those tiers. The structural response to this vulnerability is already underway, accelerated by the convergence of forces that were already reshaping supply chains before the current crisis arrived – the Covid-19 pandemic, Ukraine, and the energy transition. The defining shift is regionalisation: shorter supply chains, friend-shored inputs, and a fundamental reorientation from efficiency to resilience. But the full costs of this shift – duplicated operations, increased compliance burdens, and concentration risk in the event of a regional disaster – have not yet fully materialised, and the pace of change remains uneven, with many organisations still waiting for larger players to move first. Some degree of globalisation will ultimately be preserved, precisely because global networks provide a resilience of their own.

The Three Converging Crises 

The International Energy Agency has warned that the world may be entering the biggest energy crisis in history. However, the situation is more complex than a single crisis. What we are seeing is the combination of three major problems happening at the same time: geopolitical conflicts, weaknesses in countries that heavily depend on imported energy, and growing climate risks affecting energy infrastructure. 

For many landlocked and import-dependent countries that are already struggling from previous shocks, energy insecurity is not a temporary problem but an ongoing challenge. At the same time, climate change is making energy systems more vulnerable. Extreme weather events such as cyclones, floods, heatwaves, and wildfires are damaging power plants, fuel facilities, and energy networks, causing further disruptions. 

The most vulnerable countries sit at the intersection of all three crises. More broadly, the energy crisis is linked to some of the biggest challenges of the 2020s – the interaction between human actions, advancing technology, and climate hazards. Among these, climate disruption is likely to become the most serious long-term challenge of this century. 

Building the Three Pillars of Energy Security

Energy security is a top priority for both governments and companies. While affordability and sustainability matter, reliable access to energy is still the most important factor. Energy security depends on three main areas: 

• Geographic diversification: Countries need to rely on a wider range of suppliers, not just traditional regions like the Middle East, but also places such as the Atlantic Basin, Venezuela, and Guyana. 
   

• Energy mix diversification: Countries need multiple energy sources. Some may continue using fossil fuels in the short term to support growth and affordability, even alongside the global shift to cleaner energy. 
   

• Infrastructure and access: Energy systems must be expanded and protected, especially as climate risks increasingly threaten critical infrastructure. 

What Needs to Change 

A global downturn is likely to affect food security, healthcare, and energy security the most, especially in vulnerable emerging economies. Avoiding these impacts requires action in three areas at the same time, although this is difficult to achieve in practice. 

• First, governments and countries should stop only reacting to crises and instead prepare for them in advance. This means setting up financial support systems that are already planned and automatically activated when risks reach a certain level, like those used in humanitarian aid. 
   

• Second, countries need better tools to manage risk, such as parametric insurance and risk pooling. These provide quick financial help when energy prices suddenly rise, helping to reduce wider social and economic damage.
   

• Third, better coordination is needed. The information and risk data already exist, but they are spread across different organisations. The challenge is to connect data, financial tools, and policy decisions so they work together effectively. 

Who Needs to Act 

Addressing the energy crisis requires integrated action across the energy value chain – across government, international bodies, and the private sector.  

• Governments should create stable, long-term policies and incentives that encourage investment in all types of energy infrastructure. Consistent policy is more important than strict regulation alone. 
   

• International bodies need to improve coordination across regions and help align energy systems, especially where cross-border infrastructure is required.
   

• Companies should be involved early in designing policies and continue investing in new energy solutions like renewables and decentralised energy systems. 

Breaking down silos, motivating dialogue, and building bridges between them is not an aspiration – it is the only way to create a secure, sustainable, and inclusive energy future.

Conclusion 

In many ways, the current disruption has acted as a catalyst for the energy transition, with the entire energy industry, from oil and gas, to nuclear, to renewables, trying to respond to this crisis at a real pace. For governments, energy security has risen to the top of the agenda. We are even seeing this play out among domestic households, through surging demand for solar panels and home batteries – driven not by net zero commitments, but by a simple desire for access to power at affordable rates.  

Yet from another angle, we have seen such momentum in previous years, and it was lost when governments became distracted with other priorities and net zero began to fracture as a political consensus. The current uncertainty in the energy industry is just another wake-up call for the need for long-term planning. The uncomfortable truth is that we cannot keep being surprised every couple of years. 

There is opportunity in systemic crisis. The question is whether this time, that opportunity will be seized – for the sake of innovation, reinvention, and the kind of structural revolution the global energy system so badly needs.  

Key Takeaways 

• The most destabilizing variable to world trade is uncertainty, but this time of uncertainty is also a time of opportunity. 

• Resilience needs to be proactive – leadership today requires anticipating change, taking responsibility, and acting before crisis escalates. 

• The energy crisis is not one crisis but three converging simultaneously – geopolitical disruption, structural fragility in the most vulnerable economies, and accelerating physical risk to energy infrastructure itself – and the countries least equipped to respond sit at the intersection of all three. 

• The key priority right now is energy security, which is built on geographical diversification, energy mix diversification, and access to/ new energy infrastructures. 

• We know where the damage will land, and we have the tools to act – the problem is that the knowledge, the instruments, and the decision-makers remain in three separate silos. 

• Resilience requires integrated action across three levels – government, international bodies, and companies. 

• This crisis can be a catalyst – but only if this time, unlike the last, momentum is not lost.  

These are precisely the kinds of challenges that the Resilience World Nexus Summit was built to address. In a world where energy security has become the defining strategic priority – and where geopolitical disruption, structural fragility, and climate risk are converging faster than most organisations can respond – the need for collective, cross-sector thinking has never been greater. The summit convenes C-suite executives and senior leaders who recognise that resilience is not a cost to be minimised but a strategic asset to be built. It is a forum where global decision-makers come together to turn uncertainty into advantage, and to ensure that when the next crisis arrives, and it will, they are ready. Join us in London (Church House Westminster) on the 6–7 of October. 

This article was authored by the Resilience World Nexus Summit (RWN) team. 

www.rwnsummit.com  

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