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The energy transition in Europe—a solution for net zero carbon?

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Abstract

Climate change has generated intense concerns from public authorities and international institutions with regard to shaping the behavior of companies, consumers, investors, and other stakeholders so as to manage this challenge as efficiently as possible. In order to address the climate emergency in the post-pandemic era, recovery plans need to trigger decarbonization, and a green transition, including specific investments and providing a more adaptive structure of the sources of energy in different regions, able to meet the need for a systemic shift towards a more sustainable economy that works for both people and the planet. The main measurable effect of energy production and consumption is by far represented by carbon emissions. In the present paper, we aim to identify the statistical significance of several factors influencing the carbon dioxide emission per capita in the European countries—level of economic development, level of globalization, trade openness, and the intensity of energy transition measured by the share of renewable energy in total energy consumption. The results show an increased interest of the experts in energy consumption model shift through green energy increased share, with relatively high differences among the 42 European countries analyzed. The analysis was conducted for the period 1990–2018 and policy differences depending on variables (GDP/capita, globalization index, trade openness, and renewable energy share in total energy consumption) were identified. The results showed that the carbon dioxide emission per capita evaluation designed model is representative of the European countries. The fact that the targets set by European non-EU member states for reducing CO2 emissions are lower than for the EU is influencing the dynamics of the energy transition, with implications for the size and destination of funds to finance the development of renewable energy.

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Fig. 1

Source: based on https://www.climatewatchdata.org/ghg-emissions?breakBy=regions&calculation=PER_CAPITA&chartType=line&end_year=2018®ions=EUU%2CWORLD%2CECA&start_year=1990

Fig. 2

Source authors based on the studies

Fig. 3

Source authors based on literature review

Fig. 4

Source: IRENA 2022, http://irena.org

Fig. 5

Source: IRENA 2022, http://irena.org

Fig. 6

Source: WoS database, authors extraction based on selected words

Fig. 7

Source: authors’ selection from the WoS database, based on selected words

Fig. 8

Source: authors’ selection from the WoS database, based on selected words

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Availability of data and materials

Data used are public information.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Statistics and Econometrics, Bucharest University of Economic Studies, 010552, Bucharest, Romania

    Simona Andreea Apostu

  2. Institute of National Economy, 050771, Bucharest, Romania

    Simona Andreea Apostu, Mirela Panait & Valentina Vasile

  3. Department of Cybernetics, Economic Informatics, Finance and Accounting, Petroleum-Gas University of Ploiesti, 100680, Ploiesti, Romania

    Mirela Panait

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  1. Simona Andreea Apostu
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  3. Valentina Vasile
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All authors contributed to the study’s conception and design. Material preparation, data collection, and analysis were performed by Simona-Andreea Apostu, Mirela Panait, and Valentina Vasile. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Simona-Andreea Apostu, Mirela Panait, and Valentina Vasile, and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Annex

Annex

Table 12 Summary statistics of dependent and explanatory variables in the case of cluster 1
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Table 13 Summary statistics of dependent and explanatory variables in the case of cluster 2
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Table 14 Summary statistics of dependent and explanatory variables in the case of cluster 3
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Apostu, S.A., Panait, M. & Vasile, V. The energy transition in Europe—a solution for net zero carbon?. Environ Sci Pollut Res 29, 71358–71379 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-20730-z

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