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Advances in Sustainable Development and Renewable Energy: Economic, Policy and Environmental Impact

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A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Social Ecology and Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 June 2023) | Viewed by 6899

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Special Issue Editors

Dr. Jacek Brożyna

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Guest Editor

Department of Quantitative Methods, The Faculty of Management, Rzeszow University of Technology, 35-959 Rzeszow, Poland
Interests: energy, society and environment; energy market; renewable energy; energy policy; energy security; energy demand consumption; energy efficiency and energy intensity; energy efficiency; sustainable development; economy
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Prof. Dr. Christian Lis

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Guest Editor

Department of Econometrics and Statistics, Institute of Economics and Finance, Faculty of Economics, Finance and Management, University of Szczecin, ul. Mickiewicza 64, 71-101 Szczecin, Poland
Interests: issues of prosperity and poverty; growth theories; economic convergence (income, absolute, club convergence); green energy; sustainable development; gross value-added induced by investments; investment multiplier; capital formation; economics of seaports (cost-benefit analysis CBA; feasibility studies), sustainable transport; comparative analysis of standard of living; quantitative methods in economics (statistics, econometrics); multivariate comparative analysis of multidimensional economic phenomena

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Thanks to the successive stages of the Industrial Revolution, we have achieved not only a certain level of technological advancement but also the awareness of caring for the environment and future generations, which we define as Sustainable Development. By this concept, we also express the need to continuously monitor the activities carried out.

Sustainable development in the field of energy covers a wide range of activities leading to the reduction of environmental pollution and the efficient use of energy.

To describe the phenomena related to sustainable development, many new concepts have been introduced, such as "carbon footprint", "energy efficiency", "energy intensity", etc.

In this Special Issue, we would like to invite you to publish articles describing progress in sustainable development and renewable energy, taking into account economic, political and environmental factors. We are curious about both the results of research using already existing methods and the presentation of new measures of sustainable development.

The topics covered in this Special Issue may cover broadly understood issues related to energy, in particular renewable energy and its impact on the natural environment, as well as on the quality of life. Articles presenting the impact of climate policy and renewable energy on energy prices and CO2 emission allowances, as well as on energy security, will be interesting. We are also eager to find out if renewable energy from solar and wind power plants (onshore and offshore) is able to ensure the continuity of the energy supply in various weather conditions, or should some solid fuel power plants be kept? In December 2012, the directive on energy efficiency entered into force in the European Union. This is another interesting approach that shows that energy demand should not be meet only by increasing energy production but also by efficient energy use.

The issues presented above are only a proposal, and other topics related to sustainable development and energy will be welcome. Authors also are not limited to any specific country or region.

Dr. Jacek Brożyna
Prof. Dr. Christian Lis
Guest Editors

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 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

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

sustainable development
sustainability in supply chains
renewable energy
energy security
energy policy
energy demand and consumption
energy efficiency and energy intensity
energy market, prices and emissions trading system
financial risk in the energy market
innovations in the energy sector and energy technology
the influence of weather on renewable energy production and demand
energy and environment
environmental effects of greenhouse gas emissions
climate change

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

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23 pages, 325 KiB

Open AccessArticle

More Government Subsidies, More Innovation of New Energy Firms? Evidence from China

by Mei Feng and Ye Wang

Sustainability 2023, 15(11), 8819; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15118819 - 30 May 2023

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1668

Abstract

This paper evaluates the causal relationship between government subsidy and the innovation performance of new energy firms through count models using 2007–2021 data from China’s listed new energy companies. By looking at the subsidy for listed new energy firms and the number of granted patents, we find government subsidy policies significantly boost firms’ innovation performance. We estimate that a tenfold increase in government subsidy would lead to an increase of 7.11 in the total number of granted patents for new energy firms. Furthermore, a heterogeneity analysis shows such an effect varies depending on the nature of property rights, subsidy scale, and region for new energy firms. To be specific, state-owned firms are more dependent on government subsidy, the effect on innovation is generally higher in the high-subsidy group than in the low-subsidy group while being higher in the low-subsidy group when it comes to low-tech design patents, and firms in the eastern region are most sensitive to government subsidy. This paper also assesses the role of R&D investment in how government subsidy policies boost firms’ innovation performance; that is, by increasing their R&D funding investment rather than R&D manpower investment. These findings illustrate that in developing countries, government subsidy is effective in boosting new energy firms’ innovation performance. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Sustainable Development and Renewable Energy: Economic, Policy and Environmental Impact)

19 pages, 1329 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Can Setting Up a Carbon Trading Mechanism Improve Urban Eco-Efficiency? Evidence from China

by Wenjun Ge, Derong Yang, Weineng Chen and Sheng Li

Sustainability 2023, 15(4), 3014; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15043014 - 07 Feb 2023

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1767

Abstract

The Carbon Emissions Trading Pilot Policy (CETP) has attracted more scholarly attention. However, most existing studies are only singularly focused on carbon emission reduction or economic development. More research is needed to determine whether it can promote green and sustainable urban development. Therefore, this paper takes the data from 284 prefecture-level cities in China from 2007 to 2016 as the research sample, uses ecological efficiency as the indicator to measure the sustainable green development of cities, and uses the difference method (DID) and the propensity score matching difference method (PSM-DID) to study whether CETP can achieve the sustainable green development of pilot cities. The results show that CETP can improve pilot cities’ ecological efficiency and realize cities’ green and sustainable development by optimizing the industrial structure and promoting technological innovation. In addition, the impact of CETP on different cities is also significantly different. Compared with small and medium-sized cities and non-provincial capital cities, CETP has a greater impact on large cities and provincial capital cities. Compared with central and western cities, CETP has a greater impact on eastern cities. CETP can improve the ecological efficiency of non-resource cities, but it cannot change the ecological efficiency of resource cities. Our models survive numerous robustness checks. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Sustainable Development and Renewable Energy: Economic, Policy and Environmental Impact)

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16 pages, 1063 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Has Central Environmental Protection Inspection Promoted High-Quality Economic Development?—A Case Study from China

by Haoran Li, Min Zhou, Qing Xia, Xiaoru Hao and Jian Wang

Sustainability 2022, 14(18), 11318; https://doi.org/10.3390/su141811318 - 09 Sep 2022

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1452

Abstract

Environmental regulatory policies are crucial to the high-quality development of China’s economy. Can central environmental protection inspection, another major innovation in China’s environmental regulation policy, significantly contribute to high-quality economic development? To address this question, this paper is the first time to intensely discuss the relationship between central environmental protection supervision and the high-quality development of China’s urban economy. The research level is expanded from the previous micro-enterprise level to the macro level. Starting from the city, the main body of green innovation, and using the propensity score matching and difference-in-differences methods, we test the impact of central environmental protection inspection on high-quality economic development. A preassessment at the regional level reveals that the green total factor productivity of the inspected cities is significantly higher than that of the non-inspected cities, and parallel-trend tests and placebo tests also support the result. Subsequently, the persistence of the policy impact is further analyzed, and the results show a significant impact only in the year of policy implementation. Finally, the heterogeneity analysis shows that central environmental protection inspection can significantly promote high-quality economic development in cities in the eastern region, but has a significant inhibitory effect on the western region. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Sustainable Development and Renewable Energy: Economic, Policy and Environmental Impact)

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Other

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24 pages, 2341 KiB

Open AccessEssay

Consistency between Environmental Performance and Public Satisfaction and Their Planning Intervention Strategies: A Policy Text Analysis of Urban Environmental Planning

by Nan Wu, Cunkuan Bao and Weichun Ma

Sustainability 2023, 15(6), 4842; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15064842 - 09 Mar 2023

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1224

Abstract

The Chinese government has been working hard to improve environmental performance. However, considering that public feedback is not always complimentary, there is still room for improvement in its protection work. In China, environmental planning is the dominant direction of the government’s environmental governance. Therefore, an analysis of environmental planning could explain the policy incentives that lead to inconsistent performance and satisfaction, and could enable us to explore how to improve planning to more effectively achieve environmental governance goals. This study classified 37 Chinese cities into four types based on consistency in performance and satisfaction. Taking environmental planning policy as the research object, the planning work arrangements of different cities to improve environmental performance and public satisfaction were analyzed through hand-coding. Our study found that environmental planning in these cities puts more emphasis on basic and engineering arrangements that can effectively improve environmental performance, while work arrangements that involve improving public environmental satisfaction are relatively few. Moreover, (1) cities with high environmental performance and high public satisfaction have made relatively substantial arrangements in improving environmental performance and satisfaction during environmental planning; (2) cities with high environmental performance and low public satisfaction have a certain foundation for environmental governance, but tough governance or high public expectations weaken environmental satisfaction; (3) cities with low environmental performance and high public environmental satisfaction have low environmental performance values due to the huge energy consumption of resources or a lack of pollution disposal capacity; and (4) most of the cities with low environmental performance and low public environmental satisfaction share common geographical and historical environmental problems that make it challenging to considerably enhance public satisfaction and environmental performance in the short term. Based on the above findings, this paper believes that greater environmental governance can be achieved by promoting a change in environmental planning from the existing “elite” planning paradigm to a “participatory” planning model. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Sustainable Development and Renewable Energy: Economic, Policy and Environmental Impact)

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