Convergence in renewable energy sources diffusion worldwide

Abstract

The diffusion of renewable energy sources (RES) is a fundamental objective of the worldwide policy actions for sustainable development, at the UN level with the sustainable development goals (SDG) recommendations, to ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all (SDG 7). Also, primary attention to RES has been given at the EU level with the new Green Deal and the new objectives of the Next Generation EU after the Covid pandemic, and at the level of national Governments worldwide. So far, there has not been an analysis of the RES convergence process across countries worldwide, given that the issue of climate change is a global externality. Previous analyses have focused on specific regions, such as EU, OECD, provinces of China. This paper fills this gap, providing new evidence on the convergence process of RES for the 176 countries that account for more than 98% of the world population, from 1990 to 2018. A common panel data set has been used to take into account countries’ specific effects. Several socio-economics and political variables are introduced to test conditional convergence such as openness to trade, developments in financial markets, income distribution, level of education. The results of this new contribution reveal that there is evidence of sigma-absolute and conditional beta-convergence process for several groups of countries. Moreover, the conditional convergence analysis shows that spatial spillover effects exert rich and complex impact on convergence speed. Finally, we provide policy recommendations, highlighting that the decarbonization target in 2050 needs additional mobilization of public and private resources to pursue a common, convergence path worldwide.