Publication Type
Working Paper
Version
publishedVersion
Publication Date
12-2025
Abstract
Global sustainable finance policies are premised on publicly listed companies driving decarbonization through transparency, investor pressure, and capital market access. Analysing c. 20,000 corporate owners of renewable and fossil-fuel assets worldwide, we show the opposite: private firms own approximately 75% of global renewable generation capacity. This private dominance holds across all major technologies and regions, with listed ownership of renewable assets being the majority only in the oil & gas and technology sectors. The Paris Agreement did not alter this balance. Instead, ownership of the energy transition reflects countries' financial structures, with similar patterns observed across manufacturing, construction, and financial sector assets. Renewables are expanding largely through privately financed investments by owners that operate outside conventional regulatory and disclosure frameworks. Despite widespread rhetoric, the oil & gas sector has contributed only modestly to renewable energy capacity ownership worldwide.
Discipline
Environmental Sciences | Finance
Research Areas
Integrative Research Areas
First Page
1
Last Page
18
Publisher
SSRN
Citation
BANSRAJ, Dyaran; COJOIANU, Theodor Florian; HU, Xi; RZAYEV, Khaladdin; and URZUA, Francisco.
Privately owned companies dominate renewable energy generation ownership around the world. (2025). 1-18.
Available at: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/cis_research/463
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Additional URL
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5919744