Governance, Energy Policy, and Sustainability in the Age of AI: Cross‐Country Evidence for Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals

The Paris Agreement is a necessary global priority to achieve environmental and sustainable development goals (SDGs), which is a complex challenge for both emerging and developed economies. Given the COP29 agenda, this study explores energy equity, energy security, environmental sustainability, government effectiveness, artificial intelligence (AI), and GDP influence on CO2 emissions across 10 countries, including China, Indonesia, Italy, New Zealand, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Thailand, Turkey, and Ukraine from 2000 to 2022 by using novel econometric approaches. The outcomes reveal that energy equity, government effectiveness, AI, and GDP increased CO2 emissions, whereas energy security and environmental sustainability are found to reduce carbon emissions. However, the robustness checks validated the estimates, suggesting uniformly positive effects on emissions except for environmental sustainability. Additionally, the novel causality test confirmed the causal links between most variables and emissions, except energy equity. These findings emphasize the need for policy frameworks that integrate AI and governance reforms with climate action to ensure proper and effective measures for low‐carbon economies. SDG 7 (affordable and clean energy), SDG 9 (industry, innovation and infrastructure), SDG 13 (climate act) and SDG 16 (peace, justice, and strong institutions), by adding governance, technology, and energy policy, provide a firm insight for policies that may lead to reaching sustainable development and the COP29 agenda.