Terrorism and green innovation in renewable energy

This research examines the effect of terrorism on green technological innovation in renewable energy technologies with a panel of 87 economies between 1991 and 2017. We find that economies respond with less green innovation in renewable energy technologies when experiencing severe terrorist attacks, especially in OECD countries. Among them, wind energy green innovation witnesses the greatest collapse when facing the threat of terrorist attacks. Terrorist attacks mainly repress green innovation in renewable energy technologies of economies whose green innovation in renewable energy is lower, while having little effects on economies with strong green innovation performance. The results also show that the repressing influence of terrorist attacks on green innovation is relevant to economies with larger high-tech exports and manufacturing fundamentals. Our findings suggest that terrorism is not simply disruptive to economic performance, but also hurts one driver of sustainable growth - green innovation.