Natural Resources, Conflicts, Terrorism, and Finance: Insights from a Descriptive Data Analysis

The consumption of energy depends on the scale of economic growth and the world’s population. It also depends on the development of new technologies that have facilitated the production, distribution, and use of energy, creating a gap between the available reserves of energy and current consumption. The excessive use of fossil fuels creates many problems that can be classified into three categories. The first category relates to security, such as the emergence of armed conflicts, external military intervention, and terrorist acts. The second category is socio-economic, related to the shortage of available energy in the short and medium terms and economic disturbance in the medium and long terms. Finally, the excessive use of energy can cause environmental problems such as excessive emissions of greenhouse gases. This highlights the need for sustainable energy development, which requires significant investments in new technologies and infrastructure, making finance a critical component of the transition to sustainable energy systems. Therefore, the first section of this chapter explores the different theoretical approaches and their explanations of the negative effects of the overuse of energy. The second section investigates the factors that may explain the risk of conflicts and reveals that the presence of certain fossil fuels and their transport routes can affect the risk of conflicts. The third section examines the relationship between the consumption of energy and banking and finance, particularly the role of banks and financial institutions in financing energy projects and promoting sustainable energy development. The fourth section aims to show to what extent the development of non-fossil fuels has become the main characteristic of international energy development, and how financial mechanisms can facilitate the transition to sustainable energy systems.