Public–Private Synergy and Green Growth: Evidence From
BRICS
Energy Investments
Swarnamanjari Sahoo, Y. N. Raju, Prajukta Tripathy, Malayaranjan Sahoo, Abdullah Almeer ABSTRACT
This study examines how public–private partnership (PPP) investment in energy affects energy consumption in BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) from 1998 to 2022. The study incorporates political cooperation, research and development (R&D) expenditure, technological innovation, urbanisation, and GDP as key determinants. The CS‐ARDL approach is employed to estimate both long‐run and short‐run effects while addressing cross‐sectional dependence and slope heterogeneity. The results indicate that PPP investment and technological innovation significantly increase the share of renewable energy consumption in the long run, while R&D expenditure has a positive but only weakly significant long‐run effect. PPP investment and technological innovation also significantly reduce the share of non‐renewable energy consumption in the long run, with political cooperation exerting a weaker (10% level) negative effect, whereas R&D expenditure reduces non‐renewable energy consumption only in the short run. Technological innovation also raises total per capita energy use, consistent with rebound and scale effects. Urbanisation and GDP increase both total and non‐renewable energy use. The findings highlight the need for governments to strengthen PPP frameworks, scale up targeted R&D funding for clean energy, pair innovation policy with measures that contain rebound effects, and work jointly within BRICS cooperation platforms to accelerate the transition to renewable energy in BRICS countries.