Drivers of green energy transition: A review

Abstract

The pressing need for substantial actions to address climate change is globally recognised, notably through initiatives like the Green Energy Transition (GET) to foster a sustainable future. Despite this global acknowledgement, traditional energy sources maintain their dominance in the worldwide energy sector, with fossil fuels and solid biomass accounting for about 75% of total global Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions. The escalating GHG emissions levels directly threaten the climate, leading to global warming and adverse environmental consequences. A systematic literature review was employed to comprehensively examine the conceptualisation and drivers of the GET. The study identified Economic, Social, Political/Legal, Technological, and Environmental factors as drivers of GET. The study revealed diverse perspectives among researchers in conceptualising the GET, with a prevailing consensus that it is a global shift from carbon-intensive to sustainable and low-carbon emission energy alternatives and associated technologies. Predominantly, sustainability transition theories emerged as the most frequently applied conceptual frameworks. Commonly utilised tools for data analysis included Autoregressive Distributed Lag and Generalized Methods of Moments. Recognising the critical role of GET in mitigating GHG emissions and addressing climate change, the results underscore the importance of addressing the identified factors propelling the transition.

Keywords

Climate change / Green energy transition / Sustainable future / Conceptualisation

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Francis Muhire: Writing - review & editing, Writing - original draft, Project administration, Methodology, Investigation, Formal analysis, Data curation, Conceptualization. Dickson Turyareeba: Supervision, Conceptualization. Muyiwa S. Adaramola: Supervision, Formal analysis. Mary Nantongo: Supervision, Investigation. Ronnette Atukunda: Supervision, Conceptualization. Anthony M. Olyanga: Supervision, Conceptualization.

Data availability

No data was applied in this study.

Funding

The study was funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad) through the Norwegian Programme for Capacity Development in Higher Education and Research for Development (NORHED II) program.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgement

Francis Muhire acknowledges the PhD scholarship support by Makerere University Business School Kampala, Uganda. The scholarship is funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad) through the Norwegian Programme for Capacity Development in Higher Education and Research for Development (NORHED II) program.