Easy ones:
- Set your PC to eco-mode.
- Disable CPU performance boost (GPU does not affect HOI4 in my experience). Set additional CPU energy use to zero for normal and boost operation (might be the same as the previous one depending on what manages peformance of your system in your particular case). Win10 / Win11 always try to go to boost mode and use additional wattage if allowed. And even five additional watts are discernible for CPU-heavy apps.
- Go to Task Manager, right click HOI4 and limit affinity. Start unchecking uppermost cores first as they should be P-cores.
If it does not help and you have experience with overclocking then:
Lower clockrate. You can start with CPU but can go to memory as well though the latter is a bit tricky. You can also try to lower voltage somewhat (it's a must for overclocking but I never tried to underclock, not sure if it works without clockrate). Again do this only if you know what you're doing.