Green Economy And Renewable Energy Transitions For Sustainable Development

The fate of our planet hangs in the balance, making the pursuit of sustainable development more than a mere aspiration, it is an imperative. Green Economy and Renewable Energy Transitions for Sustainable Development delves deep into the intricate web of interconnections between the environment, green economies, and energy transitions, and lays down the intellectual foundation for a sustainable future. Drawing on the wisdom of experts in fields ranging from environmental science to policy analysis, this book unveils the multifaceted strategies needed to reduce pollution, conserve biodiversity, and effectively mitigate the relentless march of climate change. Central to sustainability is a green economy—a holistic economic system that transcends profit margins to prioritize social equity, ecological balance, and robust economic growth. Through rigorous exploration and analysis, this volume showcases how sustainable production and consumption practices and judicious investments in renewable energy sources can catalyze a transformative shift towards a more sustainable global economy. The energy transition, a substantial shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources, emerges as the linchpin of our battle against climate change. This book deciphers the intricate dance of policies, technologies, and behavioral changes required to usher in this transition. It reveals how renewable energy sources like solar, wind, and hydropower hold the key to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and staving off the catastrophic consequences of global warming. This monograph is an invaluable resource for policymakers, researchers, educators, and anyone who aspires to be a custodian of our planet's future.

A volume on the political economy of clean energy transition in developed and developing regions, with a focus on the issues that different countries face as they transition from fossil fuels to lower carbon technologies.

This book bringing together leading researchers in the field of renewable energy to discuss sustainability on a broad scale and to examine the status quo of renewable energy industry development in a global context. The volume starts with the European Union, then reviews current trends in the United States as well as the Middle East, Central Asia, and Latin America. It moves on to analyze the German transition to one hundred percent renewable energy economy and energy systems (Energiewende) with a climate protection plan and sustainable economic development; and continues on to examine the determinants of the adoption of sustainable solutions in Finland and discuss the renewable energy agenda in the European Union with the 17 Sustainable Development Goals at its core. Climate change has become one of the main global drivers for policy and this book discusses both it’s over all global development as well as spotlighting localized progress across multiple continents. Over one hundred and fifty countries have developing sustainable energy policies, tax incentives, and laws. China remains the leader in renewable energy generation; and countries including the United States, the UK, India, Spain, and Turkey, compete in the Renewable Energy Sector to attract investments. In 2018, global investments in renewables exceeded $200 billion. The state of Bahia in Brazil has been experiencing a surge in wind energy production; and public policy has had a positive effect on that expansion. Kazakhstan is a country with great renewable energy prospects, particularly in wind, hydropower plants, and solar energy. This book is a comprehensive overview and invaluable reference for all those in the renewable energy sector.

Despite the urgent need for action, there is a widespread lack of understanding of the benefits of using green energy sources for not only reducing carbon emissions and climate change, but also for growing a sustainable economy and society. Future citizens of the world face increasing sustainability issues and need to be better prepared for energy transformation and sustainable future economic development. Cases on Green Energy and Sustainable Development is a critical research book that focuses on the important role renewable energy and energy efficiency play in energy transition and sustainable development and covers economic and promotion policies of major renewable energy and energy-efficiency technologies. Highlighting a wide range of topics such as economics, energy storage, and transportation technologies, this book is ideal for environmentalists, academicians, researchers, engineers, policymakers, and students.

This edited work studies the transition to renewable energy. It offers perspectives from a wide range of disciplines, addressing macro, regional and local scales. Important lessons are also drawn from historical transitions.

This book opens up a critical dimension of energy transition taking in account multidimensional challenges on economic, social and environmental fields. The book discusses the trends in the field of energy transition and evolving practices adopted by public authorities and companies for betterment of environment and society. The editors (4) identify directions and challenges involved in the energy transition. The novelty of this book is the multidisciplinary approach, being presented the economic, social and environmental challenges involved in the energy transition. The energy transition is accompanied by a complex process of changing attitudes and behaviors of energy consumers and producers. The consequences are profound not only economically and environmentally but also socially, renewable energy being a solution for energy poverty reduction and development of rural communities. Therefore, certain social and environmental problems generated by energy poverty are solved by using renewable energy. Moreover, the complexity of the phenomenon is presented not only in terms of the analysis of the main sources of renewable energy but also the ethical aspects involved in the use of sources such as biofuels. In the case of this source, the main problem is whether the use of certain agricultural products for the production of biofuels threatens food security, especially in rural areas. All categories of stakeholders must show responsibility and get involved in this complex process which requires a remarkable technical and financial effort. The energy transition can offer innovative solutions through which the impact of economic activity on the environment is minimized, and in this way, industrial ecology achieves its objectives to support sustainable development. The demands imposed by industrial ecology must shape not only the behavior of oil and gas companies but also of entities involved in the production and consumption of renewable energy. Given the negative externalities generated, companies in the fossil fuel sector have become increasingly socially responsible, their social and environmental performance (non-financial) being presented in detail in the annual sustainability reports to inform stakeholders. Therefore, this book is an important read not only for scholars, but also for those who are interested in ensuring an environmentally sustainable future taking in account energy transition challenges.

This volume addresses renewable energy communities, and in particular renewable energy cooperatives (REScoops), in the context of the revised EU Renewables Directive. It provides a comprehensive account of the history and development of the renewable energy community movement in over six different countries of continental Europe. It addresses their visions, strategy, organisation, agency, and more particularly the challenges they encounter. This is of particular importance to gain more understanding into how renewable energy communities fare in domestic energy markets where they are confronted with regime institutions, structures and incumbents’ agency that tend to favour maintaining of the status quo while blocking attempts to empower and institutionalise renewable energy communities as market entrants having a disruptive, radical green and localist agenda. This volume will be an invaluable reference for academics and practitioners with an interest in social innovation in sustainable transitions, the role of community energy in energy markets, their agency, as well as an outlook to the impact that the EU Renewables Directive may have to change national legislation and policy frameworks to create a level playing field that is essentially more fair and beneficial to renewable energy communities.

Given the industrialized world’s historical dependence on fossil fuel-based energy resources and the now-realized perils of moving beyond the earth’s carbon budget, this book explores the myriad challenges of climate change and in reaching a low-carbon economy. Reconciling the medium-term competing, yet frequently complementary, needs for transition policies, the book provides guidelines for complex and often conflicting climate policy tasks. The book presents empirical trends in the use of carbon-emitting resources and evaluates market-driven short-termism and its adverse impact on resource use and the environment; it emphasizes a medium-term macroeconomic perspective for the transition. The authors attempt a paradigm shift towards a framework of sustainable macroeconomics. They survey relevant historical models, conduct empirical and numerical analyses of the climate change-relevant dynamic models, provide empirical illustrations, and evaluate diverse policy options and implementations together with their historical evolution. New analytical issues are also considered, e.g., strategic behavior in the energy and resource sectors, energy competition and the dynamics of market shares in new energy technology, and supporting policies for dealing with the tipping points encountered in climate change. The authors suggest a multitude of market-based strategies and public fiscal, monetary, and financial policies, and longer-run planning for resource extraction -all suitable for driving sustainable growth and a transformation of the energy sector. The book also examines the multiple delaying forces slowing the transition to a low-carbon economy; these typically arise from short-termism, lock-ins, irreversibility, leakages, non-cooperative games, and other political strategies. Thus, they explain the snail’s pace evolution of current national and global climate policies. The book will appeal to scholars and students of economics and environmental science. It is also relevant for policymakers and practitioners in multilateral institutions, research institutions as well as governments and ministries of countries interested in alternative energy sources, climate economists, and those who study the implementation of sustainable and low carbon-based policies.