Wang Haijie, Zhang Tianyi, Zhang Zhenhua, Feng Yanchao
Business School, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou, 450001, PR China.
School of Economics, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, 730000, China.
Carbon Balance Manag. 2025 Aug 18;20(1):31. doi: 10.1186/s13021-025-00322-3.
Amid profound shifts in the global energy landscape, increasing attention is being paid to the causal relationships among geopolitical risks, government governance, and energy transition. Based on data covering 39 countries from 2002 to 2020, this study explores the long-term causal relationships between geopolitical risks, governance quality, and energy transition. The analysis applies cross-sectional dependence and slope heterogeneity tests, the CADF unit root test, second-generation cointegration methods, Pooled Mean Group (PMG) estimation, Method of Moments Quantile Regression (MMQR), and Granger causality tests. The results yield three key findings. Firstly, governance quality is negatively associated with energy transition, while geopolitical risks have a positive effect. Secondly, MMQR shows that these effects are more pronounced at higher quantiles of the energy transition distribution, meaning countries further along in the transition process are more responsive to changes in governance and geopolitical conditions. Thirdly, heterogeneity tests indicate that geopolitical risks exhibit a more pronounced long-term positive contribution to energy transition in economically high-growth and highly urbanized countries. These findings challenge dominant assumptions in the literature, particularly the presumed uniformly positive role of governance. The results suggest that the influence of governance and geopolitical risks on energy transition is context-dependent and nonlinear. This study provides new empirical evidence and theoretical insights to inform energy policy under geopolitical uncertainty.
在全球能源格局发生深刻变化的背景下，地缘政治风险、政府治理与能源转型之间的因果关系受到越来越多的关注。基于2002年至2020年39个国家的数据，本研究探讨了地缘政治风险、治理质量与能源转型之间的长期因果关系。分析采用了横截面依赖性和斜率异质性检验、CADF单位根检验、第二代协整方法、面板均值组（PMG）估计、矩量法分位数回归（MMQR）以及格兰杰因果检验。结果得出三个关键发现。首先，治理质量与能源转型呈负相关，而地缘政治风险具有正向影响。其次，MMQR表明，这些影响在能源转型分布的较高分位数上更为显著，这意味着处于转型进程更深入阶段的国家对治理和地缘政治状况的变化反应更为灵敏。第三，异质性检验表明，地缘政治风险在经济高增长和高度城市化国家对能源转型表现出更显著的长期正向贡献。这些发现挑战了文献中的主流假设，尤其是治理普遍具有正向作用的假设。结果表明，治理和地缘政治风险对能源转型的影响取决于具体情况且是非线性的。本研究提供了新的实证证据和理论见解，为地缘政治不确定性下的能源政策提供参考。
