The role of technological innovation in shaping the economic and social dimensions of the energy transition

Advancing the energy transition requires consideration of economic dimensions alongside a commitment to sustainability. Technological innovation, as the primary catalyst for this transition, seeks to integrate new green technologies into regional energy systems through diverse approaches. This study examines seven International Energy Agency regions, including Africa, Asia-Pacific, Central and South America, Eurasia, Europe, the Middle East, and North America, using annual data from 2010 to 2023 within a two-phase analytical framework. The framework links the Technological Innovation field to the Energy Transition field, and subsequently, the Energy Transition field to the Socio-economic Structure field. Two feedforward artificial neural networks are trained to model these linkages, with results interpreted through Shapley-based feature attribution and partial dependence analysis. Model evaluation indicates generally low out-of-sample error, with regional variation. The findings reveal significant regional heterogeneity in the primary drivers of innovation: patent activity exerts the greatest influence on transition trends in Africa, Central and South America, and Europe, while technology costs are more influential in Asia-Pacific and North America. In Eurasia and the Middle East, the roles of costs, innovation, and trade vary across specific transition dimensions. These results suggest that effective energy transition strategies should be tailored to regional contexts, emphasizing the strengthening of innovation systems where patent activity is predominant, accelerating cost reductions where technology costs are critical, and addressing trade and market-structure constraints where energy trade is a key factor.