---
title: "Energy efficiency research: papers and trends"
description: "From 2017 to 2026 (so far), the keyword “energy efficiency” appeared in 1,826 papers in the tracked journals, most of them in economics (1,050), AI (391) and operations research (196)."
url: https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/energy-efficiency
markdown_url: https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/energy-efficiency.md
license: CC BY-NC 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)
share_text: "From 2017 to 2026 (so far), the keyword “energy efficiency” appeared in 1,826 papers in the tracked journals, most of them in economics (1,050), AI (391) and operations research (196). (as of 2026-11-03)"
data_url: https://scholar4ai.com/data/rankings.json
updated: 2026-11-03T18:03:37+09:00
window: 2026-10-05 to 2026-11-03
source: OpenAlex (CC0)
---

# Papers on “energy efficiency”

Research on “energy efficiency” in the 480 tracked journals: papers per year and category, the journals, institutions and countries publishing it, the keywords studied with it and its most-cited papers. It is not among the most frequent keywords of the last 30 days, so this page has no list of its latest papers.

Back to the ranking: https://scholar4ai.com/rankings/keywords.md

## Key findings

- From 2017 to 2026 (so far), the keyword “energy efficiency” appeared in 1,826 papers in the tracked journals, most of them in economics (1,050), AI (391) and operations research (196).
- 290 of them were published in 2025, against 115 in 2017.
- Since 2023, the institutions with the most of these papers were Beijing Institute of Technology (24), Xi'an Jiaotong University (21) and Peking University (19).
- The journals publishing most of them were Energy Economics (134), Energy Policy (85) and Expert Systems with Applications (72).
- The most-cited of them is “Digitalization and energy consumption. Does ICT reduce energy demand?” (Ecological Economics, 2020), with 1,170 citations.

## Papers per year

*Papers per publication year and category*

| Category | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | 2026 (so far) |
|---|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|
| [Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/economics.md) | 90 | 89 | 104 | 106 | 96 | 89 | 127 | 127 | 137 | 85 |
| [AI](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/ai.md) | 7 | 16 | 20 | 22 | 30 | 32 | 46 | 63 | 89 | 66 |
| [Operations Research](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/operations-research.md) | 13 | 14 | 18 | 10 | 18 | 20 | 17 | 20 | 29 | 37 |
| [Management](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/management.md) | 2 | 3 | 3 | 9 | 9 | 16 | 16 | 10 | 13 | 8 |
| [Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/finance.md) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 7 | 8 | 18 | 17 |
| [Information Systems](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/information-systems.md) | 3 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 3 | 5 |
| [Tourism and Hospitality](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/tourism-and-hospitality.md) | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| [Marketing](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/marketing.md) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| [Health Economics and Policy](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/health-economics-and-policy.md) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| [Statistics](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/statistics.md) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| [Higher Education and Research](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/higher-education-and-research.md) | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| [Accounting](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/accounting.md) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| All categories | 115 | 126 | 147 | 152 | 160 | 166 | 215 | 235 | 290 | 220 |

## Where the papers come from

*Journals with the most papers, since 2023*

| # | Journal | Papers |
|---:|---|---:|
| 1 | [Energy Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/energy-economics.md) | 134 |
| 2 | [Energy Policy](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/energy-policy.md) | 85 |
| 3 | [Expert Systems with Applications](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/expert-systems-with-applications.md) | 72 |
| 4 | [Resources Policy](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/resources-policy.md) | 64 |
| 5 | [Economic Analysis and Policy](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/economic-analysis-and-policy.md) | 40 |
| 6 | [Neural Networks](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/neural-networks.md) | 29 |
| 7 | [Neural Computing and Applications](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/neural-computing-and-applications.md) | 26 |
| 8 | [Utilities Policy](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/utilities-policy.md) | 24 |
| 9 | [IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/ieee-transactions-on-neural-networks-and-learning-systems.md) | 21 |
| 10 | [International Review of Economics & Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/international-review-of-economics-finance.md) | 20 |

*Institutions with the most papers, since 2023*

| # | Institution | Papers |
|---:|---|---:|
| 1 | [Beijing Institute of Technology](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/beijing-institute-of-technology.md) | 24 |
| 2 | [Xi'an Jiaotong University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/xi-an-jiaotong-university.md) | 21 |
| 3 | [Peking University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/peking-university.md) | 19 |
| 4 | [Xiamen University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/xiamen-university.md) | 16 |
| 5 | [Chinese Academy of Sciences](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/chinese-academy-of-sciences.md) | 15 |
| 6 | [Wuhan University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/wuhan-university.md) | 14 |
| 7 | [Hunan University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/hunan-university.md) | 13 |
| 8 | [Tianjin University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/tianjin-university.md) | 12 |
| 9 | [Chongqing University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/chongqing-university.md) | 11 |
| 10 | [Fudan University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/fudan-university.md) | 11 |

*Countries with the most papers, since 2023*

| # | Country | Papers |
|---:|---|---:|
| 1 | China | 470 |
| 2 | United States | 91 |
| 3 | India | 81 |
| 4 | United Kingdom | 77 |
| 5 | Spain | 40 |
| 6 | France | 40 |
| 7 | Italy | 39 |
| 8 | Australia | 38 |
| 9 | Germany | 38 |
| 10 | Saudi Arabia | 33 |

*Keywords with the most papers, since 2023*

| # | Keyword | Papers |
|---:|---|---:|
| 1 | [CO2 emissions](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/co2-emissions.md) | 103 |
| 2 | [China](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/china.md) | 99 |
| 3 | spiking neural networks | 64 |
| 4 | energy intensity | 60 |
| 5 | [energy transition](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/energy-transition.md) | 53 |
| 6 | [economic growth](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/economic-growth.md) | 51 |
| 7 | [energy consumption](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/energy-consumption.md) | 45 |
| 8 | [renewable energy](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/renewable-energy.md) | 45 |
| 9 | [environmental regulation](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/environmental-regulation.md) | 42 |

## Most-cited papers

*Most-cited papers since 2017*

| # | Citations | Per month | Title | Journal | Published | Authors |
|---:|---:|---:|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1,170 | 15.3 | [Digitalization and energy consumption. Does ICT reduce energy demand?](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2020.106760) | [Ecological Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/ecological-economics.md) | 2020-06-23 | Steffen Lange, Johanna Pohl, Tilman Santarius |
| 2 | 786 | 11.7 | [Public spending and green economic growth in BRI region: Mediating role of green finance](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2021.112256) | [Energy Policy](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/energy-policy.md) | 2021-03-31 | Dongyang Zhang, Muhammad Mohsin, Abdul Khaliq Rasheed et al. |
| 3 | 768 | 9.0 | [Institutional quality, green innovation and energy efficiency](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2019.111002) | [Energy Policy](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/energy-policy.md) | 2019-09-27 | Huaping Sun, Bless Kofi Edziah, Chuanwang Sun et al. |
| 4 | 573 | 8.4 | [Energy efficiency: The role of technological innovation and knowledge spillover](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2021.120659) | [Technological Forecasting and Social Change](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/technological-forecasting-and-social-change.md) | 2021-02-24 | Huaping Sun, Bless Kofi Edziah, Anthony Kwaku Kporsu et al. |
| 5 | 564 | 5.4 | [The impact of green innovation on energy intensity: An empirical analysis for 14 industrial sectors in OECD countries](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eneco.2017.12.012) | [Energy Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/energy-economics.md) | 2018-02-05 | Jules-Daniel Wurlod, Joëlle Noailly |

## Cite this page

Scholar4AI. (2026). Papers on “energy efficiency”. Journal and Conference Research Rankings. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/energy-efficiency

```bibtex
@misc{scholar4ai-keywords-energy-efficiency,
  author = {{Scholar4AI}},
  title = {Papers on “energy efficiency”},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {\url{https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/energy-efficiency}},
  urldate = {2026-11-03},
  note = {Journal and Conference Research Rankings; data from OpenAlex (CC0); licensed CC BY-NC 4.0}
}
```

License: CC BY-NC 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).