IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/enejou/v38y2017i5p197-222.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Policy-Induced Expansion of Solar and Wind Power Capacity: Economic Growth and Employment in EU Countries

Author

Listed:
  • Jurate Jaraite
  • Amin Karimu
  • Andrius Kazukauskas

Abstract

Given the intensifying debates on whether governments should promote particular renewable energy technologies, the main objective of this study is to investigate the long- and short-run effects of policy-induced expansion of renewable solar and wind technologies on economic growth and employment in 15 European Union (EU) member states during 1990-2013 by using panel-data time-series econometric techniques. Instead of relying on renewable energy consumption or generation as commonly done in the literature, we focus on the capacity for solar and wind power generation, which is largely a consequence of the EU’s renewable energy policies. In summary, we find that, to date, renewable energy policy- induced wind and solar power capacity promotes growth and/or employment in the short run, but these capacity increases do not stimulate economic growth in the long run in the EU-15 region. In fact, our results tend to support the opposite relationship: increases in wind and solar power capacity are associated with negative economic growth, at least at the total economy level.

Suggested Citation

  • Jurate Jaraite & Amin Karimu & Andrius Kazukauskas, 2017. "Policy-Induced Expansion of Solar and Wind Power Capacity: Economic Growth and Employment in EU Countries," The Energy Journal, , vol. 38(5), pages 197-222, September.
  • Handle: RePEc:sae:enejou:v:38:y:2017:i:5:p:197-222
    DOI: 10.5547/01956574.38.5.jjar
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.5547/01956574.38.5.jjar
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.5547/01956574.38.5.jjar?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ewing, Bradley T. & Payne, James E. & Caporin, Massimilano, 2022. "The Asymmetric Impact of Oil Prices and Production on Drilling Rig Trajectory: A correction," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    2. Pesaran, M. Hashem & Smith, Ron, 1995. "Estimating long-run relationships from dynamic heterogeneous panels," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 79-113, July.
    3. M. Hashem Pesaran, 2007. "A simple panel unit root test in the presence of cross-section dependence," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(2), pages 265-312.
    4. Ohler, Adrienne & Fetters, Ian, 2014. "The causal relationship between renewable electricity generation and GDP growth: A study of energy sources," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 125-139.
    5. Sadorsky, Perry, 2009. "Renewable energy consumption, CO2 emissions and oil prices in the G7 countries," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 456-462, May.
    6. Apergis, Nicholas & Payne, James E. & Menyah, Kojo & Wolde-Rufael, Yemane, 2010. "On the causal dynamics between emissions, nuclear energy, renewable energy, and economic growth," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(11), pages 2255-2260, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jurate Jaraite & Amin Karimu & Andrius Kazukauskas, 2017. "Policy-Induced Expansion of Solar and Wind Power Capacity: Economic Growth and Employment in EU Countries," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 5).
    2. Lau, Lin-Sea & Choong, Chee-Keong & Ng, Cheong-Fatt & Liew, Feng-Mei & Ching, Suet-Ling, 2019. "Is nuclear energy clean? Revisit of Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis in OECD countries," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 12-20.
    3. repec:jle:journl:163 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Asafu-Adjaye, John & Byrne, Dominic & Alvarez, Maximiliano, 2016. "Economic growth, fossil fuel and non-fossil consumption: A Pooled Mean Group analysis using proxies for capital," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 345-356.
    5. Kahia, Montassar & Aïssa, Mohamed Safouane Ben & Lanouar, Charfeddine, 2017. "Renewable and non-renewable energy use - economic growth nexus: The case of MENA Net Oil Importing Countries," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 127-140.
    6. Apergis, Nicholas & Chang, Tsangyao & Gupta, Rangan & Ziramba, Emmanuel, 2016. "Hydroelectricity consumption and economic growth nexus: Evidence from a panel of ten largest hydroelectricity consumers," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 318-325.
    7. Kangyin Dong & Xiucheng Dong & Qingzhe Jiang, 2020. "How renewable energy consumption lower global CO2 emissions? Evidence from countries with different income levels," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(6), pages 1665-1698, June.
    8. Salim, Ruhul A. & Hassan, Kamrul & Shafiei, Sahar, 2014. "Renewable and non-renewable energy consumption and economic activities: Further evidence from OECD countries," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 350-360.
    9. Skare, Marinko & Ozturk, Ilhan & Porada-Rochoń, Małgorzata & Stjepanovic, Sasa, 2024. "Energy as the new frontier: Dynamic panel data analysis revealing energy's transformative role in economic growth and technological progress," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 200(C).
    10. Jin, Taeyoung & Kim, Jinsoo, 2018. "What is better for mitigating carbon emissions – Renewable energy or nuclear energy? A panel data analysis," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 464-471.
    11. Alam, Md. Mahmudul & Murad, Md. Wahid, 2020. "The impacts of economic growth, trade openness and technological progress on renewable energy use in organization for economic co-operation and development countries," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 382-390.
    12. Destek, Mehmet Akif & Aslan, Alper, 2020. "Disaggregated renewable energy consumption and environmental pollution nexus in G-7 countries," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 151(C), pages 1298-1306.
    13. Dogan, Eyup & Seker, Fahri, 2016. "Determinants of CO2 emissions in the European Union: The role of renewable and non-renewable energy," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 429-439.
    14. Jaganath Behera & Alok Kumar Mishra, 2020. "Renewable and non-renewable energy consumption and economic growth in G7 countries: evidence from panel autoregressive distributed lag (P-ARDL) model," International Economics and Economic Policy, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 241-258, February.
    15. Marra, Alessandro & Colantonio, Emiliano, 2021. "The path to renewable energy consumption in the European Union through drivers and barriers: A panel vector autoregressive approach," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    16. Matheus Koengkan & José Alberto Fuinhas & Isabel Vieira, 2024. "The Asymmetric Impact of Energy’s Paradigm Transition on Environmental Degradation: a Macroeconomic Evidence from Latin American and the Caribbean Countries," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 15(2), pages 6451-6474, June.
    17. Alper, Aslan & Oguz, Ocal, 2016. "The role of renewable energy consumption in economic growth: Evidence from asymmetric causality," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 953-959.
    18. Kahia, Montassar & Ben Aïssa, Mohamed Safouane & Charfeddine, Lanouar, 2016. "Impact of renewable and non-renewable energy consumption on economic growth: New evidence from the MENA Net Oil Exporting Countries (NOECs)," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 116(P1), pages 102-115.
    19. Paramati, Sudharshan Reddy & Mo, Di & Gupta, Rakesh, 2017. "The effects of stock market growth and renewable energy use on CO2 emissions: Evidence from G20 countries," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 360-371.
    20. Masako Ikegami & Zijian Wang, 2020. "The suppressive effect of renewables on nuclear energy: implications for OECD countries," Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, Springer;Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies - SEEPS, vol. 22(2), pages 247-265, April.
    21. Saint Akadiri, Seyi & Alola, Andrew Adewale & Akadiri, Ada Chigozie & Alola, Uju Violet, 2019. "Renewable energy consumption in EU-28 countries: Policy toward pollution mitigation and economic sustainability," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 803-810.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:enejou:v:38:y:2017:i:5:p:197-222. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.