Cognitive Warfare and Information Control in the Geopolitics of Europe's Energy Transition

Europe’s green transition depends not only on the deployment of renewables and critical raw materials, but also on shaping domestic and international narratives that underpin public support, investment flows, and geopolitical partnerships. This paper argues that “information control”—the coordinated use of digital platforms, strategic communication, and cognitive-warfare techniques—is emerging as a decisive geoeconomic instrument in the global energy transition. Drawing on hybrid-warfare theory and human-rights frameworks, it examines how state and non-state actors deploy disinformation, algorithmic amplification, and platform design to advance or obstruct Europe’s regulatory ambitions (e.g. the European Green Deal, carbon-border adjustment mechanism). First, the paper maps key vector points of cognitive influence: social-media campaigns targeting EU publics on nuclear vs. renewables; deep-fake content undermining trust in battery-metal supply chains; and digital blockades of climate finance platforms. Second, it analyzes case studies of hybrid-information operations attributed to China (promoting BRI-funded green infrastructure) and to Russia (sowing doubt over EU energy security and urging partnership with fossil-fuel states). Third, it assesses the EU’s current defenses—digital-literacy campaigns, platform transparency mandates, and the proposed Digital Services Act—against the core principles of freedom of information and privacy enshrined in international humanitarian law and human-rights treaties. By combining qualitative discourse analysis of social-media data with doctrinal review of EU regulatory texts, the study shows that Europe’s strategic autonomy in the energy domain is as much a contest of narratives as of technologies. It concludes with policy recommendations for strengthening “cognitive resilience,” including: Embedding human-rights impact assessments in climate-tech procurements; Establishing an EU-level Task Force on Energy-Narrative Security, akin to cyber-security CERTs; Expanding partnerships with civil-society fact-checking networks in the Global South. Ultimately, this paper contributes a novel perspective to the workshop’s call by bridging geopolitics and geoeconomics through the lens of information operations—demonstrating that control over the digital “battlefield of ideas” will shape Europe’s capacity to lead the global energy transition.