An RSM analysis shows how middle market companies are using AI across energy subsectors.
Key takeaways
Supply chain resilience and a broader energy mix have become more important.
A capital spending spike, while positive, is adding demand pressure to the industrial ecosystem.
What is the energy outlook?
RSM’s energy outlook provides insights into the major trends shaping the U.S. energy sector throughout the year, and the impacts of those trends on middle market energy companies. In our latest edition, we analyze company filings to understand how businesses are using artificial intelligence. Our analysts also write about the Iran conflict reshaping energy resilience and how the data center boom is affecting the industrial ecosystem.
Energy trend 1: AI use cases in the energy industry: Insights from research and company filings
An RSM analysis of how middle market energy companies are deploying AI offers valuable insights, including lessons learned and an understanding of how AI use cases vary across energy subsectors.
For this analysis, we reviewed company disclosures, including earnings calls, annual reports and investor presentations from over 300 publicly traded, North America-domiciled energy companies with annual revenue between $100 million and $20 billion from January 2021 through July 2026. We also reviewed other public sources of information for these companies, including vendor case studies, utility commission filings and engineering papers.
Energy trend 2: How the Iran conflict has reshaped energy resilience
The conflict in Iran—and the resulting disruption of oil, liquefied natural gas (LNG) and other refined products moving through the Strait of Hormuz—has had implications that go well beyond short-term commodity price swings and logistical bottlenecks. We anticipate long-term, structural impacts on countries’ and companies’ strategies around energy supply, resilience and supply chains.
Energy trend 3: How the data center boom is reshaping the industrial ecosystem
Major hyperscaler cloud service providers have announced an eye-watering level of capital expenditures in recent years amid the data center boom. Such investment, while positive, is adding demand pressure to the industrial ecosystem. More than generating demand, delivering against it in a constrained environment will be one of the biggest challenges for industrial companies. Businesses will need to plan carefully for sustained demand—expected to last at least into 2028—and invest in capacity, workforce and supplier relationships that can support multiyear lead times.
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