ARC CEO Tim Gardom reflects on the impact of current global turmoil on energy communications.
In a world of geopolitical risk, fragile supply and competing truths, energy communication will evolve from fixed messaging to real‑time storytelling.
If truth is the first casualty of war, the second is probably definitions.
As events unfold with dizzying speed and intensity, long-accepted narratives around energy security, affordability, and transition are being challenged, reshaped and in some cases abandoned completely.
What does that mean for teams like ARC, whose job is to translate one of the world’s most complex sectors – energy – into communication that resonates with audiences?
MEDIA: AN ENERGY-DRIVEN WORLD, WHO KNEW?
One striking result of media coverage has been to remind everyone of their energy dependence.
No mention of the Strait of Hormuz is complete without the phrase ‘..a narrow stretch of water that allows for the transportation of roughly a fifth of the world’s oil supply’. Once just a map detail, the Strait is redefined as a global pressure point, crucial to our welfare.
Food no longer starts at the supermarket shelf. It’s now part of a supply chain story featuring hydrocarbon-based fertilizer, gas heated greenhouses, diesel fuelled transport and plastic packaging.
Our personal energy story – beyond putting fuel in the car and turning on the lights – demands sharp redefinition.
MARKETS: REACTING FASTER THAN UNDERSTANDING
The oil market responded quickly to hostilities.According to Reuters, traders began pricing in a “geopolitical risk premium” immediately.
However, there’s a feeling that markets are not so much predicting the future as trying to keep up with it. Prices are moving not just in reaction to what has happened, but to what might happen next: a tanker incident, a wider strike, a miscalculation.
Volatility itself is the redefining the story here.
COMPANIES & GOVERNMENTS: CAUTION, HESITATION, AND QUIET RECALCULATION
So far there haven’t been dramatic announcement, but rather a steady pulling back from risk. Response from energy companies has been cautious and, in some ways, low-profile.
National messaging has been similarly measured, emphasising preparedness, coordination, and stability without escalating the situation further
International measures (release of strategic oil reserves by the IEA) and national moves (Australia’s 50% fuel tax cut) are presented as ‘sensible precautions’.
But beneath the messaging and the measures, is a redefined story of quickly things might change.
RENEWABLES: PART OF THE CONVERSATION, BUT NOT THE IMMEDIATE ANSWER
The upset of established patterns of the fossil fuels market has highlighted the complicated role of renewable energy in the situation.
On one level, the argument feels obvious: systems built on domestic wind, solar, and other renewables are less exposed to geopolitical chokepoints like the Strait of Hormuz. Let’s use them to fill the gap.
In real life, despite healthy growth in the sector, renewable systems cannot fill those gaps yet. And renewable technologies have their own critical dependencies, specifically in key minerals to make them.
So, as the crisis unfolds, two narratives are emerging in parallel. One focuses on safeguarding traditional energy sources—ensuring supply, stabilising markets, and managing immediate risk and future shocks. The other recognises that the energy transition is inseparable from security: renewables are no longer just a climate story, but a critical part of reliable, resilient energy systems.
As it often the case in energy transition, both stories are true at once.
ENERGY COMMUNICATORS: WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR US?
The thoughts below are neither a comprehensive plan nor a single-issue Manifesto. They reflect the challenges and opportunities that ARC’s clients now have in this extraordinary moment of redefinition for the energy sector.
First, we’re going to need some new, better definitions.
The world of the conventional Energy Trilemma (Security, Affordability, Sustainability) has gone, and we need new definition to describe the forces shaping our energy future. Peter Godfrey FEI has written insightfully on this for the Energy Institute. https://knowledge.energyinst.org/new-energy-world/article?id=140174
Energy Security and Energy Transition can no longer be defined as are no longer separate priorities but two sides of the same strategic coin. Supply lines can no longer be treated like the Gulf Stream – an unstoppable force of nature – but redefined as vulnerable and critical parts of energy infrastructure.
Secondly, future energy communication cannot rely on fixed messages. It must be flexible, grounded, and responsive, evolving as the story changes.
This involves changes both to the way that clients brief and support their messaging, how it’s shared for different audiences and the media strategies and technologies we deploy. At ARC, we’re seeing a communications model emerge that has more the feel of a newsroom than a static exhibition.
ENERGY CLIENTS: ON THE FRONT LINE
Finally, and most importantly for ARC, this crisis redefines everyone telling an energy story as a global spokesperson. From the company CEO to the expert host on the company exhibition stand – everyone is speaking (and being listened to) within the wider world context. New briefing, information and training will be required but we know that our clients have the passion, commitment and deep knowledge to do this.
The story we tell next must reflect these realities. The future of reliable power, economic stability, and global resilience depends on embracing both traditional and renewable sources, framing transition as essential, not optional.
Energy communication is the bridge between complexity and comprehension—because the future doesn’t wait, and neither should our story.