A1660
Title: Innovation in solar energy technologies and the implications for environmental and economic sustainability
Authors: Fakhri Hasanov - KAPSARC (Saudi Arabia) [presenting]
Peter Pedroni - Williams College (United States)
Abstract: The focus is on investigating the extent to which various technological innovations in solar energy have facilitated climate change mitigation and economic development as measured by CO2 emissions and GDP via the generation of renewable energy. It is done in the context of a heterogeneous panel VAR analysis for which a multi-country panel of annual data on solar energy patents spanning from 1990 to 2021 is employed. The approach also allows the exploration of the extent to which various policies have tended to enhance the link between innovations in solar energy technologies and sustainable environmental and economic outcomes. Examples explored include the degree of international integration with respect to global value chains, foreign direct investment and general trade openness. Other examples include spending on human capital development and environmental regulatory policies. It also demonstrates how the approach can be used to study the experiences of individual countries and include case studies for prominent energy-producing countries such as Saudi Arabia. Finally, it is shown how to incorporate the results of the analysis into large-scale macro-econometric models such as Saudi Arabia's KGEMM energy and emissions augmented macro-econometric model with an eye toward informing the design of policies to achieve and maintain sustainability in energy, economic development and the environment in line with overall development goals.
