Innovation in the electricity sector in the age of Disruptive Technologies and renewable Energy Sources: A Bibliometric study from 1991 to 2019

Abstract

This article aims to elaborate a bibliometric study about innovation in the electricity sector, in the era of disruptive technologies and renewable energy sources, to describe, quantify and analyze the studied themes, including their evolution, from 1991 to 2019. The following methodological procedures were used: a) definition of keywords and research in the Scopus and Web of Science databases; b) analysis of 159 selected texts, using Iramuteq with the R software statistical interface, for qualitative, quantitative and statistical data processing. As a result, it was possible to observe that innovation in the electricity sector in the world is incipient. In the USA, UK, Australia, China and 31 OECD countries including Brazil, renewable energy sources and technological innovation have found difficulties to make progress. In tightly regulated markets, regulation has yet to find the point and balance that can foster an enabling environment for sectoral technological innovation. The Brazilian electricity sector (SEB) also finds difficulty to innovate, as indicated in the studied literature. It was found that the research gap, which was the absence of bibliometric studies on innovation in the electricity sector in the world and in Brazil, was satisfactorily met.