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The purpose of this paper is to analyze the competitive advantage of German renewable energy firms in India and China. Porter's diamond model is modified and specified for the renewable energy industry.

Based on Porter's diamond model of competitiveness, the authors examine the demand for renewable energies in India and China and the ability of German firms to meet this demand.

While the overall demand for renewable energies in India and China is significant, the study reveals remarkable differences in the fields of biomass, solar and wind energy. The findings are meant to address managers in the renewable energy industry and to aid policy makers in environmental support and action.

A major theoretical contribution of the study is the application of Porter's diamond model to the renewable energy industry, as well as the identification and operationalization of the relevant causal and proxy variables.

The paper provides a detailed analysis of the factors on which the competitive advantage of German renewable energy technologies in India and China is based. This helps managers of renewable energy firms to focus on those areas where they have particular strengths and to introduce measures to overcome potential weaknesses.

The authors used a modified version of Porter's diamond model and specified it for the renewable energy industry. The model was tested empirically in Germany and both emerging countries on the basis of secondary data.

In this study, entrepreneurial internationalization in renewable energy industry as a high-tech and emerging industry was explored. The focus of this study is on firm level factors to understand how and why these companies entered the international markets and what are their challenges and difficulties in this process. To answer these questions, two main streams of literature were used: international entrepreneurship (IE) and sustainable entrepreneurship.

Case study methodology is selected for this research. Because this subject is new and empirical researches in renewable energy industry are scarce, a method to gather research and in-depth data was adopted. Following suggestions by Eisenhardt (1989), a multiple-case design method was used with nine cases of entrepreneurial companies in renewable energy industry from Spain.

Results show that in renewable energy industry firms, resources and capabilities such as need for funding and rapid commercialization are key factors that encourage companies to enter the international market. However, having access to the technological knowledge cannot be a compelling reason for internationalization of renewable energy companies from Spain. Moreover, the interaction between the large and small firms is an important factor that facilitates the process of internationalization.

In this study, the focus was only on firm level factors, whereas other levels of analysis such as entrepreneur, environment, policy scheme and industrial factors need further attention in future studies. Moreover, this study is only limited to Spanish companies, and future studies can be replicated in other context.

Findings of the study have significant theoretical and empirical implications. First of all, it explains the entrepreneurial internationalization by taking advantage of sustainable entrepreneurship literature. In addition, empirical results of this study are significantly important for entrepreneurs to implement effective internationalization strategy to survive. Findings of this study can help policy makers for designing a supportive scheme for further development of this industry in the international markets.

This paper explores the entrepreneurial internationalization of renewable energy companies as an emerging industry by taking advantage of two streams of literature: international entrepreneurship and sustainable entrepreneurship. The results show the phenomenon of early internationalization in pre-commercialization phase. These findings put emphasis on interaction between large and small firms in process of internationalization in this specific industry.

This paper aims to extend the small body of literature on energy industry transitions on firm level. A growing number of articles shed light on paradigm shifts in the energy industry and the influence of renewable energies on industry structures. In the majority of cases, the authors analyze changes on a global or national level.

Energy companies’ forecasting capabilities are particularly important to enable them to react in time to upcoming changes in industry structures. In this context, we analyze annual reports of German energy companies to evaluate their economic and technological forecasting competencies.

Big energy providers offer high economic forecasting quality, but seem to be less able to derive valid forecasts in terms of renewable energies from the currently unstable political frameworks. On the contrary, renewable energy companies do not seem to suffer from these difficulties and provide good foresting accuracy in terms of renewable energy development, but show less accurate economic forecasting quality.

Big energy providers need to find the means of responding to the challenges and integrate changing political guidelines and support into their forecasting system. Renewable energy companies, in contrast, should focus on company-level profitability and the respective economic forecasting competencies.

This paper makes a significant contribution to the literature on the subject of energy industry transitions by providing insights from publicly available data on firm level. The findings are highly relevant for managers of the energy industry and policy makers in this field.

The purpose of this paper is to consider the development of “Green” jobs in one region of the European Union, Scotland, where the government has sought to develop renewable and sustainable energy industries and associated employment.

The paper analyses selected secondary data and policy documents and conceptualises issues concerning employment in the renewable energy sector.

It analyses published data and projections on employment in renewable energy sectors, considering the reasons for the lower actual job creation. Many of the jobs in the renewable energy sector are likely to be high skilled, so there is need to support the development of low-skilled workers and job seekers so that they can enter and progress in the industry. Similarly there is a strong gender bias in the industry which may similarly reduce the entry and retention of the best staff and inhibit social equity.

The paper suggests that “Career first” recruitment and development policies are needed which emphasise improving both productivity and the “quality” and attractiveness of sustainable, long-term careers in the sector.

In addition to relying on general labour attraction policies and separate industry-specific skills initiatives for those already in work, more attention needs to be given to developing sustainable employment with career progression for people moving into, or already in, the industry.

The links between support for those moving into jobs and developing the skills of existing workers in sustainable industries have been under researched and this paper adds new conceptual developments, in terms of “Career” first approaches and empirical analysis of employment in renewable industries in Scotland.

This paper aims to elaborate on the crucial effects that a seemingly detrimental policy change in Spain has had on the international entrepreneurial activities of domestic renewable energy (RE) firms.

Primary data were collected from nine RE companies in Spain and then triangulated with secondary data and interviews from informants in other local institutions.

Domestic RE firms, due to an institutional scape driver action, reacted to an increasingly uncertain and generally more adverse renewable energy policy framework in this country by preferring to internationalise towards foreign markets that had lower political uncertainty than the domestic one.

This paper complements previous research primarily on firm-specific factors that enhance internationalising firms’ survival and growth through a focus on the impact of a changing institutional-political environment at the home country-level.

Practitioners in the RE sector should analyse the risk of focusing only on the home market, as it can be too dependent on uncontrolled variations in domestic energy policy.

The findings indicate that a more stable and supportive, long-term perspective in the domestic RE policy is essential for the sustained growth and development of this emerging industry.

To analyse the strategy by which a number of purposefully selected companies were able to use international expansion as a survival-seeking strategy against a drastic policy-level change in the domestic RE market.

The purpose of this study is to provide a foundational understanding of the internationalization of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) operating in the context of renewable energy markets. The focus is on exploring and identifying the managerial-, firm- and environmental-level antecedents to their international expansion, which also furthers the understanding of the distinct SME’s internationalization context within the renewable energy market.

The study adopts a qualitative multiple case study approach in a Finnish SME context and identifies the antecedents’ relative prominence at the managerial, firm and environmental levels.

The findings indicate that, although internationalization antecedents of renewable energy SMEs differ owing to market forces such as trends, networks and changing regulatory policies, they share antecedents similar to those of SMEs in other industries.

The main limitation of this study is its single-country home market empirical context. Future studies should expand analysis to different regulatory and regional environments.

To the authors’ knowledge, there are few studies that explore the antecedents of SMEs’ internationalization, especially in the renewable energy market context. Hence, this study contributes to the international business and entrepreneurship literature by illustrating the fundamental managerial-, firm- and environmental-level antecedents to the internationalization of SMEs operating in the renewable energy business. In addition, it highlights the peculiarities of renewable energy SMEs’ internationalization, suggesting that extant research on SMEs’ internationalization has not adequately captured the intricacies present in the internationalization of renewable energy enterprises.

Policy or regulatory risks represent one of the major barriers for renewable energy investments, especially against the background of several retrospective reductions of support schemes in Europe. This paper aims to contribute to the literature by offering a categorization of major risk drivers and determinants of policy risk associated with renewable energy projects in developed countries.

Based on a narrative (traditional) review of the academic literature and supported by industry studies regarding cases of support scheme cuts in Europe (from the end of 2010 until the end of 2013), the paper derives determinants of policy risks of renewable energy investments.

As a main result, the paper offers a concise categorization of major risk drivers of policy and regulatory risks associated with renewable energy investments in developed countries along with potential indicators.

The derived categorization of major risk drivers and the set of indicators are of high relevance for risk management and risk assessment of renewable energy investments, where understanding the underlying risk drivers is vital. The findings can thus be applied when establishing a sound risk management for renewable energy investments.

The paper helps (potential) investors, policymakers and regulators to assess policy risks associated with renewable energy investments.

The purpose of this study is to identify the effects of MNCs measured by the foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows on the promotion of renewable energy consumption and non-renewable energy in Bangladesh. It is an emergency issue these days and makes some policy suggestions.

Based on the literature review, the study sets a time series models to empirically test FDI degrades the environmental quality in Bangladesh, using the parametric (GMM, IV estimations) and non-parametric approaches (quantile regression).

The main findings drawn from the empirical analysis are as follows. First, the FDI inflows lead to more CO₂ emissions in the Bangladeshi economy. In other words, the MNCs promote the usages of non-renewable energy which causes an increase in pollution. Second, the FDI inwards discourage renewable energy consumption and in terms of magnitude, the negative impacts of FDI on renewable energy are higher than the positive effect of FDI on CO₂ emissions. This makes the situation worse.

This study is limited to Bangladesh and explores the total impact of FDI on the environment. For further investigation, it would be better to do a detailed investigation on the FDI-renewable and nonrenewable energy relationship. For instance, one could test which type of FDI promotes green energy consumption and which one is dirtier. So, the sectorial FDI effects on pollution.

Most past studies parametric techniques and did not compare the effects of FDI on renewable and non-renewable energy consumption, Unlike the previous empirical studies, this paper uses GMM and IV estimations for the parametric approach and quantile regression (QR) as a robustness check. Also, it is the first study that approves the crowding-out effect of non-renewable using the FDI channel.

Energy consumption in transportation accounted for over 29% of total final consumption (TFC) of energy and 65% of global oil usage, and it is highly connected to mobility. Mobility is essential for access to day-to-day activities such as education, leisure, healthcare, business activities, and commercial and industrial operations. This study examines the energy consumption for the transport industry, and the level of renewable energy development in some selected Sub-Saharan African (SSA) nations. This study relied on previous publications of government, reports and articles related to the subject matter. Vehicle ownership is fast increasing, particularly in cities. Still, it begins at a relatively low level because the area is home to countries with the lowest ownership rates worldwide. In its current state, the energy sector faces significant challenges such as inadequate and poorly maintained infrastructure, dealing with increasing traffic congestion in cities, large-scale imports of used vehicles with poor emission standards that affect air quality in cities, a lack of safe and formally operated public transportation systems, and inadequate consideration for women and disabled mobility needs. Motorcycle and tricycle are dominating the rural areas, accounting for a substantial amount of this growth. Aviation is the largest non-road user of energy, and this trend is predicted to continue through 2040 as Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grows and urbanisation expands. This study revealed the energy consumption for the transport industry, and the level of renewable energy development in some selected SSA. Rail and navigation lag behind current global levels. The usage of biofuel and rail transport was recommended.