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• Climate policy should be diversified to meet the needs of all countries. • The ability of renewable energy to solve the emissions problem is questioned. • The energy efficiency has no statistically significant changes in 2010–2020. • There is a contradiction between Sustainable Development Goals 7 and 13. Improving energy efficiency is considered to be important and cost-effective strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which is crucial in the face of global climate change. This study hypothesizes that there are significant differences in the impact of energy efficiency on economic and energy systems. Using quantile regression method, the impact of economic and energy characteristics on energy-related greenhouse gas emissions in 120 countries over the period 2010–2020 is investigated. Detailed analyses are conducted by dividing the countries into 12 groups based on gross national income per capita (Atlas method) and the share of resource rents in gross domestic product. A macro-level system of indicators for assessing energy efficiency is proposed, which can be linked to the economic and energy characteristics of the systems: National Energy Efficiency, Energy Intensity Ratio, Primary Energy Production Efficiency, Industrial Sector Energy Efficiency, Share of Low Carbon Energy, Population Energy Efficiency. The findings show that (1) global energy efficiency has remained largely unchanged over the decade; (2) there are differences in energy efficiency between fossil fuel producing and non-fossil fuel producing countries; (3) the factors that have an inverse effect on emissions in fossil fuels dependent countries include industrial energy efficiency and population energy efficiency, which are far from exhausting their potential; (4) despite the recognized importance of energy efficiency, its impact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions globally has been unnoticeable. The study highlights that Sustainable Development Goals 7 and 13 on energy affordability and emission reductions are conflicting and require harmonization of mechanisms to achieve them, such as balancing climate change mitigation investments, identifying the potential for energy efficiency improvements across economy or improving energy saving practices. The overall conclusion suggests that there is an urgent need to review current decarbonization and energy efficiency initiatives, given the lack of significant global progress in reducing greenhouse gas emissions or improving energy efficiency between 2010 and 2020. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change mitigation is a topical issue with growing debate in the context of the renewable energy transition, global partnership, governance, and economic growth. The complexness of climate change makes it difficult to predict relationships and formulate policies across varied countries. Motivated by the core mandate of the Kyoto Protocol, we examined the individual, combined and interactive impact of growth in income, renewable energy, foreign direct investment, and governance on greenhouse gas emissions. We decomposed the relationships to account for the theories of scale effect, composition effect and technique effect. The study utilized a dynamic heterogeneous estimation technique with a panel data from 1990 to 2017 in 47 Sub-Saharan African countries. Our adopted empirical framework made it possible to account for heterogeneity, a situation that may be prevalent in countries with varied economic and environmental policies. The empirical results revealed that increasing the share of renewable energy by 1% declines greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 35.32% (95% Confidence interval) while a 1% increase in the coupling effect of income level, governance, and renewable energy consumption intensifies climate change by 0.79%. The interactive effects of scale, composition, and technique indicators were found to worsen climate change. The decoupling effect revealed that while foreign direct investment, income level, and governance exacerbate climate change, renewable energy consumption lessens climate change and its impact. From a policy perspective, the magnitude of the technique effect of renewable energy consumption depends on, inter alia , its share in the energy portfolio, technological innovation, and country-specific policy instruments. The study demonstrated that decoupling renewable energy from economic growth propels the transition from fossil fuels, leading to energy efficiency— explaining the decline in GHG emissions. • Dynamic heterogeneous method is used to develop 13 conceptual tools for mitigating climate change. • Climate change is decomposed into scale, composition and technique effects. • Increasing renewable energy consumption reduces climate change in Sub-Saharan African. • Income level exacerbates pollution intensities which affect climate change and its impact. • The study confirmed the validity of the Pollution Haven Hypotheses in Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]