Scaling Up the Clean Energy Transition inTurkey: The Role of Financial Development,Green Technologies, and Economic Complexity

Abstract

The transition to a low-carbon economy represents a significant challenge and opportunity for Turkey, whose energy mix is 90% fossil fuel. In this context, this research aims to analyse the role of financial development (FD), economic complexity (EC), and environmental technology (PET) on renewable energy consumption (REC) in Turkey over the period from 1980 to 2020. The Fourier Bootstrap ARDL (FBARDL) approach, a new technique that can capture up to five smooth structural breaks and address small sample biases, indicates that a significant ‘green structural lock-in’ exists, where a 1% rise in FD and EC causes a 1.12% and 0.70% decrease in REC, respectively. In other words, Turkey’s financial development and economic complexity are still locked into fossil fuel consumption. In contrast, PET positively influences REC, where a 1% rise in PET
causes a 0.12% rise in REC. The Granger causality test further confirms that FD and PET have a one-way causality to REC. The research contributes to the existing literature on the Turkish energy equilibrium, providing a much-needed antidote to the prevailing ‘positive finance’ assumptions in non-OECD economies.