Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG7) – ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all – is essential for achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, including its SDGs. It is also critical for meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change. However, progress on the SDG7 targets has been insufficient, with energy poverty, increasing demand, and the need for rapid decarbonization continuing to present major challenges. The UN General Assembly’s decision in 2024 to extend the UN Decade of Sustainable Energy for All until 2030 is intended to keep energy at the center of global sustainable development efforts.

Within this context, the fourth annual ENERGYNOW: SDG7 Action Forum served as an important platform to review progress, sustain momentum, and drive ambitious action, particularly in the lead-up to the third review of SDG7 at the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF) in 2026 and the SDG Summit in 2027, which will help shape the direction of sustainable development beyond 2030.

During the SDG7 Action Forum, participants strategized how best to scale up innovative solutions and mobilize resources and partnerships to end energy poverty and advance a just energy transition, with the aim of accelerating progress towards SDG7. Sessions addressed such issues as: clean cooking, gender, AI, a just and inclusive transition, synergies toward progress on achieving the SDGs and climate goals, and carbon free energy.

The 2025 Forum also drew on opportunities identified by UN Secretary-General António Guterres in his July 2025 address on “supercharging the clean energy age,” in which he reaffirmed the inevitability of the transition to renewables and the benefits such a transition will bring. In addition, the annual progress report on the Energy Compacts was launched, showing how governments, businesses, foundations and others are advancing their commitments, having pledged over USD 1.4 trillion in finance and investment towards boosting renewables and energy access by 2030.

Bringing together energy leaders and experts from governments, international organizations, business, and youth groups from around the world, the SDG7 Action Forum 2025, which was organized by UN-Energy, met from 24-25 September 2025 in New York on the margins of UN General Assembly and as part of Climate Week NYC.

The Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB) writers for this meeting were Leila Mead and Deborah Davenport, Ph.D. The Digital Editor was Ángeles Estrada. The Editor was Chris Spence.