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The World Ahead | Asia in 2024

The energy transition could create unexpected linkages in Asia

A flower with an electric symbol in the centre, with two stems tangled up
Illustration: Sam Island

By Dominic Ziegler

To focus only on China’s great-power contest with America risks missing other shifts that will prove every bit as important to Asian nations. The biggest has to do with the region’s energy transition. In 2024 burgeoning energy linkages across Asia could rewrite the way the region deals with itself, in ways that both reinforce and undermine a narrative of China’s dominance.

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This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition of The World Ahead 2024 under the headline “The green hand of friendship”

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