A new report on energy efficiency by the International Energy Agency has shown that improvements in efficiency since 2000 have been smaller than the total additional energy demand across the world. Without the improvements of the last 18 years, the world would be consuming around 12% more energy than it is, which points to a highly significant improvement in terms of energy. However, the 37 TJ saved via efficiencies compares to 109 TJ of additional consumption, and growth in global primary energy demand in 2017 (at 2%) was higher than at any time since 2011. According to the IEA, opportunities are being missed, as cost-effective and available technologies could be implemented to further reduce energy consumption, and looking to the future, if all opportunities were taken up, global GDP could double and the population increase by 20% without increasing energy demand. Such a world would have a profound impact on the combustion industry.