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Energy Economics, Energy Transition and Environmental Sustainability

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 October 2026 | Viewed by 2283

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Guest Editor
1. School of Global Business & Leadership, Danubius International University, Galati, Romania
2. Women Researchers Council, Azerbaijan State University of Economics (UNEC), Istiqlaliyyat Str. 6, Baku 1001, Azerbaijan
3. Faculty of Administration and Business, University of Bucharest, Bucharest, Romania
Interests: sustainable development; finance, green finance; energy economics; environmental economics; FinTech; stock market; public economics; taxation; social policy, public spending
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Sustainability, in a broader sense, can be achieved by decoupling economic and social activities from climate change, which generates greenhouse gas emissions. In this challenging endeavor, energy plays a decisive role, with targets set for a transition towards renewable sources and diversifying consumption to decrease emissions. Besides reducing emissions, environmental sustainability includes a focus on other aspects, such as biodiversity protection, urban green development, environmental regeneration, and active initiatives. The costs and trade-offs significantly challenge nations and global markets, stretching budgetary boundaries. The limited nature of financial resources stresses the importance of coherent public policies in determining the adequate balance of actions. Many national economies struggle with development issues, chronic public deficits, and other structural deficiencies, such as weak institutional frameworks.

In this complex context, this Special Issue will select theoretical and empirical original studies approaching topics such as, but not limited to, the following: 

  • the impact of energy transition on social and economic sustainability;
  • energy diversification in the context of just transition;
  • energy transition and social justice;
  • technological innovation for energy transition;
  • internalizing externalities and sustainable development;
  • policy instruments for environmental sustainability;
  • renewable energy environmental costs and benefits; 
  • green growth and sustainable development;
  • green urban development.

I look forward to receiving your contributions. 

Prof. Dr. Alina Cristina Nuţă
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • energy economics
  • sustainable energy
  • energy transition
  • decarbonization
  • economic and energy efficiency
  • environmental justice
  • sustainable development
  • climate-resilient development
  • sustainable/green finance
  • biodiversity
  • natural resources
  • social equity

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

41 pages, 1951 KB  
Article
Natural Resource Rents and Capital Formation Nexus: Empirical Evidence on Foreign Direct Investment as a Moderator from the BRICS Economies
by Fahmida Laghari, Farhan Ahmed, Rafique Ur Rehman Memon and Daniela Haluza
Sustainability 2026, 18(1), 547; https://doi.org/10.3390/su18010547 - 5 Jan 2026
Viewed by 959
Abstract
This study investigates the impact of natural resource rents (natural gas, forests, minerals, and oil) on capital formation in BRICS economies from 1990 to 2023. It focuses on the importance of natural resource rents and their influence on capital formation in Brazil, Russia, [...] Read more.
This study investigates the impact of natural resource rents (natural gas, forests, minerals, and oil) on capital formation in BRICS economies from 1990 to 2023. It focuses on the importance of natural resource rents and their influence on capital formation in Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. Foreign direct investment (FDI) is included as a moderating factor. Using the method of moment quantile regression (MMQR), the study finds that higher natural resource rents reduce gross fixed capital formation (GFCF) in the upper quantiles. In contrast, FDI dampens these adverse effects and strengthens the positive impact on GFCF in the upper quantiles. Granger causality analysis reveals that natural gas rent, FDI, GDP, trade openness, domestic investment, and institutional quality all affect capital formation, with feedback relationships evident. There is unidirectional causality from forest rent and mineral rent to capital formation, and from capital formation to inflation and financial development. Propensity score matching (PSM) indicates that BRICS economies with higher FDI also have higher GFCF, owing to FDI’s influence on resource rents. The seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) analysis for cross-country comparison indicates that Russia has higher NGR, FR, and OR, resulting in more pronounced negative changes in Russia’s capital formation than in India. Additionally, the results of the SUR analysis indicate that China’s higher NGR, FR, and OR are associated with larger adverse changes in capital formation than those in Russia. The findings from additional analysis using the PSTR model, with gross capital formation as the dependent variable, indicate that when institutions are weak, natural resources reduce gross capital formation and foreign investment in resource sectors yields minimal spillovers. However, when institutions are stronger, natural resources are used productively, and investment from outside the resource sector yields broader benefits, boosting GCF. Moreover, robustness checks using panel fixed-effects regression and endogeneity analysis with a system GMM estimator show that higher natural resource rents are associated with weaker capital formation, and that FDI mitigates the negative influence of natural resource rents as a moderating factor. These empirical results can inform policy recommendations on natural resource rents and FDI to achieve high capital formation in BRICS economies. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Economics, Energy Transition and Environmental Sustainability)
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