Shows that economic concerns about jobs, costs, and consumption, rather than climate change, are likely to drive energy transition in developing countries.

This volume analyzes the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on energy transition and climate change from an economic perspective. Since its emergence in early 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic has had a powerful effect on multiple facets of the global economy. The unknown scope and duration of the pandemic and its associated economic shocks have made energy security and the process of clean energy transition highly unpredictable. To combat this, this edited volume presents a wide range of theoretical and empirical research at the nexus of the COVID-19 pandemic and energy, resource, and environmental economics. Chapters focus on four major themes: the impact of crises on energy security, the role of resilient energy systems in society, the challenges of clean energy transition, and economic impacts of COVID-19 on climate change. Providing rigorous analysis of an evolving situation that will continue to impact the global energy market, this volume will be of interest to researchers and students of energy economics, environmental economics, and resource economics as well as policy professionals involved in climate change and energy transition.

This book breaks new ground in the studies of green transition. It frames the ongoing transformation in terms of a "battle of modernities" with the emerging vision of ecomodernity as the final destination. It also offers a systematic exploration of the potential for extensive transformation of carbon-intensive sectors – with a focus on energy and transport – towards a low or post-carbon economy. The book does so in a comparative perspective, by pointing to a diversity of techno-economic and institutional solutions in the mature Western economies, and in the rapidly growing East and developing South. The contributors highlight a broad spectrum of available alternatives as well as illuminate conflicting interests involved. They also demonstrate how solutions to the climate challenge require parallel technological and governance innovation. The book advocates a new, overarching vision and agenda of ecomodernity – based on a synergistic paradigm-shift in industry, politics and culture – to trigger and sustain the ecological innovation necessary to tip development in a green direction. This vision cannot be monolithic; rather, it should reflect the diverse interests and conditions of the global population. This book is aimed at researchers and postgraduate students of energy, transport, environmental and climate policies, as well as development, environment, innovation and sustainability.

This edited work studies the transition to renewable energy. It offers perspectives from a wide range of disciplines, addressing macro, regional and local scales. Important lessons are also drawn from historical transitions.

Energy and environmental issues in the former Soviet sphere rank as global policy priorities for three reasons. First, civilian application of military nuclear materials multiplies the threat of terrorism. Second, Russian and Caspian oil resources affect world markets, Western energy security, and regional stability. Third, climate change may become a global challenge commensurate with the Cold War, and the transition economies--the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe--offer the world's largest and cheapest near-term opportunities for curbing greenhouse gas emissions. Yet, the region remains unprepared to deal with these issues, and Western assistance has failed to help. A "second generation" of reform efforts is needed, led from within, but supported by the West. In Energy and Environmental Policies in the Transition Economies William Chandler synthesizes disparate, specialized analyses and publications. He draws on a relatively large body of research on energy technology, oil and gas markets, geopolitics, finance, economic reform, and environmental science specific to Russia, eastern Europe, and the transition economies. In successive chapters Chandler reviews energy use, energy efficiency, nuclear safety and security, petroleum geoeconomics, coal, utility monopoly and competition, and environmental and climatic change in the former Soviet Union and Central and Eastern Europe. Chandler also considers options for a "second generation" of reform efforts. The subject matter of the book is significant not only for the energy and environmental policies themselves, important though they are, but because those policies in turn affect regional political stability and Western energy security. Energy and Environmental Policies in the Transition Economies will be of considerable interest to policymakers in government, to private-sector actors, to academic scholars, and to students of international energy and environmental politics.

The world is currently undergoing an historic energy transition, driven by increasingly stringent decarbonisation policies and rapid advances in low-carbon technologies. The large-scale shift to low-carbon energy is disrupting the global energy system, impacting whole economies, and changing the political dynamics within and between countries. This open access book, written by leading energy scholars, examines the economic and geopolitical implications of the global energy transition, from both regional and thematic perspectives. The first part of the book addresses the geopolitical implications in the world’s main energy-producing and energy-consuming regions, while the second presents in-depth case studies on selected issues, ranging from the geopolitics of renewable energy, to the mineral foundations of the global energy transformation, to governance issues in connection with the changing global energy order. Given its scope, the book will appeal to researchers in energy, climate change and international relations, as well as to professionals working in the energy industry.