Geopolitical risks and resilience strategies in driving investment in clean energy infrastructure along the Belt and Road Initiative

The Belt and Road Initiative is one of the major crucial projects for global economic integration, sustainable growth, and fostering trade across Asia, Europe and Africa. One of the major initiatives for the success of the BRI project is the investment in clean energy infrastructure (IREI). This study examines the factors of clean energy infrastructure investments across Belt and Road Initiative countries from 2000 to 2023 with a focus on the impact of geopolitical risk, resilience strategies and other control variables. The study employs the advanced econometric approach of the Method of Moments Quantile Regression (MMQR). The outcomes of the study revealed that geopolitical risk significantly deters IREI, while resilience strategies mitigate the adverse effects of external shocks and boost IREI. The positive impact of interaction terms of geopolitical risk and resilience strategies further highlights the moderating role of resilience strategies to offset geopolitical uncertainties in high investment-oriented countries. The fixed effect and random effects techniques further endorse the reliability of the MMQR estimates. Further, the Dumitrescu-Hurlin panel causality test exhibited a bidirectional association between geopolitical risk and IREI. The outcomes of the study highlight the need to prioritize resilience strategies, such as the adoption of environmental policies and mitigation of geopolitical risk through regional cooperation and other economic dynamics in BRI countries.