Check against delivery.

Dear excellencies, colleagues, and friends,

Let me begin by expressing my appreciation to the International Energy Agency for convening this roundtable.

Earlier this year, I had the pleasure of attending the Energy Security Summit in London, hosted by the IEA and our UK colleagues.

Today, I have three main points: We need sufficient energy, we need stable energy, and we need competitive energy.

Electricity is the backbone of modern society, and Europe has a highly weather-dependent power system.

This is why we have to ensure enough capacity and flexibility. Our energy systems need sufficient baseload to ensure a robust and stable energy supply. Measures and investments that ensures capacity must be a priority.

In Norway, we have benefitted from a highly renewable and stable electricity system. Our power system differs from most other European countries in the sense that our production is highly decentralized with over eighteen hundred hydropower production plants across the country. We have established more than a thousand water reservoirs, roughly 50 % of Europe’s entire hydropower storage capacity. In addition, we have a strong grid. We have a substantial surplus of renewable electricity, with both controllable hydropower and intermittent hydro, wind and solar.

However, even in a country with a lot of hydropower and strong infrastructure, we are not immune to the growing impacts of climate change.

Exposure to nature and the elements is a part of Norway’s identity. But we are already experiencing more frequent and intense natural hazards, as floods, icing on power lines, and storm damage. These events can disrupt supply. For example, earlier this year an avalanche in the northern part of Norway caused overhead line collapse that resulted in a blackout for several hours.

To meet challenges going forward, Norway has adopted a proactive and systematic approach to climate adaptation in the electricity sector.

We continuously assess the vulnerability of our energy infrastructure and analyze how climate change affects both energy consumption and renewable energy production. One of our key priorities is to prevent dam failures in a future climate. The Norwegian government provides recommendations for climate-resilient design and upgrades of dams and is currently revising the dam safety regulation to ensure it reflects new climate realities.

We also integrate climate adaptation into the development of new energy infrastructure. We set clear requirements in licensing processes that include assessments of natural hazard risks, ensuring that new installations are built to withstand future conditions. For example, transformer stations must now meet specific standards for flood protection and emergency preparedness.

Resilience is bot just about hardering infrastructure. Resilience must be embedded in planning, permitting, and operations, bot treated as an afterthought.

To summarize; I repeat my three main points: We need enough energy, we need stable energy, and we need competitive energy. A strong energy system is essential for everything—be it competitiveness, climate goals, or resilience

We support the IEA’s role and initiative for knowledge-sharing and joint action. By aligning our approaches and learning from each other’s experiences, we can make sure that our electricity systems that are not only clean and secure, but also resilient to the challenges ahead.

Thank you.