Green Energy, Environmental Quality, and Economic Security Nexus in Ghana
摘要
The chapter presents an investigation involving a four-way linkage between green energy investment, environmental quality, economic growth, and economic security in the case of Ghana, using simultaneous equation modeling approach over the time frame of 1999–2019. Investment in green energy growth is not a replacement for sustainable development; there is a positive correlation between the two. Green investment, thus, provides the practical and flexible framework and approach for achieving measurable progress across enhanced environmental quality, economic growth, and human security (economic security) within a dynamic process of economic development. The chapter takes into consideration policy debate of conventional structural economic transformation that historically contributes to environmental degradation and increased pollutants and effluents from industrialization and technological change. On the other hand, investment in green energy does not discount the possibility of leapfrogging the application of less polluting green technologies including alternative energy sources. It reveals that there are unidirectional causal impacts that is in support of the theory of conservation, from the processes of economic growth to renewable energy applications and usage. A combination of structural transformation and green economy calls for a balancing act that presents the need for ensuring that economic growth is, thus, both transformative and environmental sustainability, reducing environmental degradation, and protecting environmental life support systems as the basis for enhancing economic security.