In the meantime, here are three technologies that we considered including on the 2025 list but ultimately decided to leave out. Even though these nominees didn’t make the cut this year, they’re still worth watching. We certainly will be.
Virtual power plants
Virtual power plants are energy systems that connect many different technologies to produce and store energy. They allow utility companies to connect solar panels and wind turbines to grid batteries and electric vehicles, and better manage the flow of electricity across the grid.
During peak electricity consumption periods, software linked to smart meters could one day automatically decide to power a person’s home using electricity from a fully charged electric vehicle placed in a person’s garage. neighbor, thereby reducing demand on the network. The software could also determine how to compensate the electric vehicle owner accordingly.
In the United States, it is estimated 500 virtual power plants now provide up to 60 gigawatts of capacity (this is about as much total capacity as the American network will add This year). Some of these systems are also operational in China, Japan, CroatiaAnd Taiwan. But many more virtual power plants would need to be configured before we could start affecting the grid as a whole.
Useful AI agents
AI agents are all the rage right now. These AI-powered assistants is supposed to schedule our meetings, book our trips, and do all kinds of online tasks on our behalf. Agents use generative models to learn how to navigate websites and desktop software (and manage our passwords and credit card details). They will perhaps interact and coordinate with other people’s agents along the way.
And behind them lies a real development power: Salesforce launched a platform where businesses can create their own customer service agents, and The Claude model from Anthropic gains the ability to navigate a computer using a mouse and keyboard, just like people.
However, many challenges remain in making these agents understand what you mean when you make specific requests and allowing them to reliably perform the necessary actions. Given the considerable hurdles, we think it may be some time before they are good enough to be truly useful. Perhaps AI agents will arrive, but not yet.
eVTOL
The acronym is a mouthful, but you can think of electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft as being a bit like electric helicopters. Most versions in development are not designed to be personal vehicles; they would be flown by pilots to transport commuters from the suburbs or to take visitors downtown from the airport. One day, these air taxis may fly themselves.