Innovación tecnológica inducida:un análisis bibliométrico de la investigación en energía solar, 1960-2018

Abstract

In recent years the number of natural disasters caused by global warming has grown. Following these disasters, the use of fossil fuels to meet global energy demand has been criticized by considering the alternative of replacing oil with cleaner energy such as solar, wind and hydraulic. However, the adoption and implementation of alternative energies face both economic and structural advantages and disadvantages. Among the former are the growing technological innovations that increase its attractiveness in terms of opportunity costs, and in the latter are the low economic competitiveness that alternative (or clean) technologies still offer compared to oil. This article addresses the origin of the substitution from a historical framework by postulating that the technological boom of alternative energies, in particular solar energy was induced by the oil embargo that the United States suffered in 1973 and served as an incentive to fire research in these technologies. Following a bibliometric search methodology, the analysis is divided into six stages to demonstrate that the rise in the price of oil triggered the rise of alternative energy but as the number of published articles grew, the research area was consolidated, separating from the effect price.