Adaptive Engineering, Chapter 11: The innovation efficiencies of European countries in solar PV and wind sectors

Climate change is accepted as the biggest challenge for the European Union (EU) and for this reason being a climate-neutral continent by 2050 is a priority for Europe. Deploying more renewables, increasing energy efficiency and electrification are the most important tools serving to this policy. With the support of innovation, renewable energy sectors could be more effective in climate change mitigation and adaptation measures. In this study, the two most mature renewable energy sectors; solar photovoltaic and wind energy in European countries are examined. The countries are grouped under two classifications according to their overall innovativeness levels in the EU scoreboard. The first group with a score above the EU average is composed of innovation leaders and strong innovators, the second group is the moderate and emerging innovators. With a two-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA), Research and Development (R&D) efficiency and innovation financial efficiency are analyzed for a period of 4 years by taking the average values. This approach improves the research results because the yearly fluctuations especially the sharp patent applications’ decline resulting from COVID-19 could be harmonized. This period is shifted for 1 year between the spending on research and employment of personnel and the patent filings. One-year gap is determined for the second step where the financial efficiencies of innovation are studied. The patent applications are taken as inputs and turnover and the exports from PV solar and wind sectors are taken as the middle-term financial outputs. The most efficient countries for PV and wind sectors and their policies are elaborated in detail and future policy implications are presented.