The emergence of green finance a conceptual framework for environmental sustainability: innovation viewpoint

Introduction

Environmental protection, action on climate change, and the attainment of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030 have become the most significant issue for our generation and the next. This is attributable to the fact that humanity survives mostly at the expense of the planet and will therefore destroy its own ecosystem in the near future; therefore, sustainable finance plays a crucial role in the climate system. A sustainable financial system develops, values, and transacts financial assets to generate real wealth for an inclusive, sustainable economy. Green finance refers to financial instruments whose returns are utilized for sustainable development projects, environmental products, and policies to promote a green economic transition toward low-carbon, sustainable, and equitable pathways (Cai, R., & Guo, J., 2021). The greatest obstacle (Falcone & Sica, 2019) in achieving sustainable development seems to be climate change, which threatens to plunge millions of people into abject poverty. According to Criscuolo & Menon (2015) risk-financing in the green sector is predicted to face greater difficulties than in other high-tech businesses. Prior research (Geels, 2013b) suggested that crisis (2008–2010) provided an opportunity for good solutions. Since 2010–2011, however, this window looks to have shrunk, since the financial-economic crisis has already had detrimental consequences on transitions to sustainable development, which may cause a slowdown. Green supply chain management as an integrated supply chain strategy is positively connected with environmental and operational performance, which indirectly improves economic health (Feng et al., 2018). D Zhang et al. (2021) examined how investment in human resources and research and development of green energy technologies enable a sustainable green economy utilizing labour-oriented production activities, with different advantages across nations. The advancement of data-driven sustainability in the realm of green finance has been characterized by a gradual incorporation of technology, environmental consciousness, and financial ingenuity. This article explores the historical account of using data to promote sustainability, specifically focusing on the development of financial technology advances and their significant contribution to advancing green finance activities throughout the years. In the mid-20th century, environmental movements arose due to worries around pollution, depletion of resources, and destruction of habitats. These actions established the foundation for increased awareness and support for environmental issues. Global governments initiated the implementation of initial environmental regulations, including standards for air and water quality, in response to escalating environmental apprehensions and to minimize detrimental effects on human well-being and ecosystems (Rehman et al., 2023; Gebhardt & Bachmann, 2023; Zhou et al., 2023). Recently, green bonds have emerged as one of the most viable options for financing clean and sustainable projects (Rehman et al., 2023). Despite the growing popularity of green bonds, there is less evidence that they are more advantageous than conventional bonds with comparable characteristics, excluding “greenness.” Gianfrate and Peri (2019) found that green bonds might play a key role in greening the economy without financially burdening issuers. Singal (2014) discovered that hospitality corporations invest more on average in environmental programmes than firms in other industries; that hospitality firms have much fewer environmental worries; that excellent financial success leads to increased investments; and that becoming green pays off in the future, creating a virtuous cycle. Fintech advancements have been instrumental in promoting green finance by utilizing data analytics to achieve favourable environmental results and support sustainable development. As we advance to the future, achieving the full extent of data-driven resilience in green lending and tackling the most important environmental concerns of our time will require ongoing technology innovation, legislative assistance, and market expansion.

Literature review

There have been recent efforts to investigate the insights of sustainable finance across seven primary categories: climate financing, green financing for sustainability, socially responsible investing, impact investing, and carbon financing, as well as governance and compliance with sustainable financing (Kumar et al., 2022). Fatica and Panzica (2021) found that, compared to conventional bond issuers with equal financial and environmental ratings, green issuers have lower carbon intensity after borrowing from the green segment. Excluding green bonds issued for refinancing makes emission reductions more pronounced, large, and long-lasting, which is compatible with new climate-friendly initiatives. Blended Finance’ models, as proposed by Rode et al. (2019), could help finance transitions to sustainable landscapes; hence, innovative financing methods for sustainable landscapes are necessary. Partridge and Medda (2020) demonstrated that a green municipal bond index outperformed the closest similar S&P index from 2014 to 2018. Schumacher et al. (2020) explored how the banking industry could manage climate risks and promote Japan’s transition to a zero-carbon, sustainable economy through sustainable financing and investment. Green bonds and sustainable investment markets are becoming increasingly important in financial decision-making due to environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues. Wendling et al. (2018) observed that selecting an NBS assessment scheme that suits one or more SDG 11 sub-objectives can enhance operational efficiency by utilising evaluation scheme synergies. According to Vörösmarty et al. (2018), selecting and managing financial assets based on social and environmental performance is rising and undergoing a structural transformation. Asset owners want investors to show how one company’s operations are more or less sustainable than another’s. Reviewing Hong Kong as the only GFCC member with an institutionalized sustainability strategy among its regulators, A. W. Ng (2018) claimed that the pattern of sustainable development is anticipated to continue because a green finance system creates economic incentives for such reporting. Environmental sustainability Gliedt and Hoicka (2015) was a major driving force behind energy projects in businesses generally, but in local organizations, it was often integrated with CSR. Green roofs, renewable energy, and water-saving systems were considered environmental sustainability measures. Hishan et al. (2019) emphasized that socioeconomic and environmental variables have a significant impact on the United Nations’ sustainable development agenda and that their member nations’ sound action plans are essential to facilitate international cooperation and promote Africa’s green growth agenda. Several studies have shown (Ng & Tao, 2016) that local currency-denominated (LCY) corporate bonds and asset-backed project bonds, including green bonds, can mobilize substantial amounts of private sector funding. There is, however, a need for support policies aimed at reducing the capital market bias for conventional energy generation technologies and regulatory policies promoting renewable energy. To combat climate change and bring about a transition towards sustainable and low-carbon growth, enormous expenditures are required. It has been found (Orsato et al., 2015) that intangible value created by voluntary environmental measures, such as access to knowledge, new capacities, and reputational benefits, explains companies’ efforts to be listed in the Corporate Sustainability Index better than intangible value. Falcone et al. (2018) demonstrated a strong narrative pressure exerted by key players from both institutional and informal channels, and by domestic players predominantly through informal channels. Such inadequacy could restrain the growth of green innovation activities if no appropriate policy measures are adopted. Developing the corporate bond market, standardized green investment terms, ensuring consistent corporate reporting, and eliminating information asymmetry between investors and receivers can significantly contribute to addressing some of the market’s inadequacies.

Pueyo (2018) examined Ghana’s primary impediments to investing in renewable energy as an unreliable off-taker, macroeconomic imbalances, regulatory uncertainty, incentives to keep prices low, and inadequate and costly domestic financing, whereas Kenya offers lucrative returns for investments in renewables, despite low demand, a lack of infrastructure and governance, and ambiguous policies that negatively impact societal acceptance for the sustainable developments. Steblyanskaya et al. (2019) demonstrated that China’s oil and gas industry’s system of sustainable financial growth could be upset in the future and suggested a method for preventing the emergence of these adverse inclinations. Specifically, the promotion of corporate social responsibility, the development of green and social financing, and the study of energy efficiency. In Russia, the stability of the oil and gas industry’s financial growth is characterized by stability during the whole predicted period. Gianfrate and Peri (2019) determined that green bonds might play a substantial role in greening the economy without financially penalising issuers. A finance ecosystem approach is necessary to accomplish a sustainable aim, according to Owen et al. (2018), which integrates complementary funding and support to develop entrepreneurial knowledge and investment readiness. Evidently, Rezende et al. (2019) there is no meaningful relationship between the intensity of green innovation and the immediate financial performance of a company. Second, the link is positive, persists over subsequent years, and gets more pronounced after two years.

As a bibliometrics survey, this study demonstrates an understanding of the implications of green finance and sustainability concepts. The necessity to implement green financial policies is altering the traditional functions of banks in creating, allocating, and circulating funds within an economy (Gianfrate & Peri, 2019; Ng & Tao, 2016). In the banking sector, the demand for immediate stakeholder participation and the formulation of clear policies has increased (Tolliver et al., 2020). Governments and regulators are increasingly focused on climate change and global warming, necessitating research into the elements that enable enterprises to engage in green finance (GF). The externality of environmental contamination gives green innovation (GI) in public management first priority. Complementing the GI process for environmental protection, GF provides financial resources to the research and development (R&D) of clean energy and environmentally friendly products and technologies. GF policies assist to reduce the effects of GI hampered industries including new items, technologies, processes, and the worldwide market under financial limitations (Agrawal et al., 2024). Maria, et al. (2023) suggested the climate-related financial hazards, green bonds, and resource model advancements are the latest breakthroughs. Important research insights for sustainable growth and novel trends help academics and government officials identify research problems and make better decisions to reach SDGs 9 and 13, which are about investing in infrastructure and innovation and addressing climate change for sustainability. Green innovation supports the development of solutions that effectively use resources and cut waste. Green innovation helps companies to recycle, reuse, and rethink their goods. It helps to reduce waste. Furthermore, supporting environmental protection and helping to lower greenhouse emissions is green innovation. Furthermore, consumers’ understanding of environmental social and governmental policies is developing. Green innovation lets companies satisfy consumer needs with less negative environmental impact. Green innovation is, all things considered, a major driver of positive social change that will help to reach sustainability targets. New ideas will help the planet to solve problems related to sustainable development and climate change (D. Ahmed et al., 2024). So, the study contributes to the development of green finance for sustainability and the identification of its fundamental financial components. Fu et al. (2023) suggested that it is desirable for green financing to support effective policies and technological innovation for harmonizing clusters, communities, and systems for sustainability via the timely adoption of renewable and sustainable energy facilities that are advantageous to the future. Certain boundaries and targets within an ecosystem that are associated with international standards are desirable for green financing. Cui et al. (2020) green investment encourages sustainable development and cleaner production. Second, tighten government regulation, lower green finance production costs for financial institutions and businesses, raise consumer pollution compensation, and decrease government supervisory costs.

This study begins with a review of recent literature in an effort to provide an overview of academic research pertinent to green finance. By gaining insight into the existing state, we intend to develop a proper grasp of the conceptual obstacles and, more crucially, to identify development trends and provide helpful scope for future research directions in this important and emerging field.

Methods

This study applied co-citation analysis of author keywords to conduct a literature review. Co-citation analysis identifies the conceptual foundations of the article by determining which papers and/or authors are most frequently co-cited within the selected sample (Kumar et al., 2022; Bhatnagar et al., 2021).

In academia, bibliometric analysis has extensively been used to assess the growth rate and popularity of a wide range of academic topics. A bibliometric analysis is a statistical technique based on publications that provides quantifiable insight into academic literature. To ensure the relevance and validity of research, it is crucial to find and select high-quality worldwide scientific articles that give original, authentic information and knowledge sources. (Pan et al., 2018). Regarding Green Finance for Sustainability, the Scopus database is systematically searched (S. Ahmed et al., 2022) after putting “Green Finance for Sustainability” into the Scopus database, a significant set of research publications was reviewed. This study analysed 2,103 papers published between January 2000 and June 2024. Among these 2,103 documents, 426 journal articles were determined as pertinent to the investigation’s purposes. Then, we identified the most pertinent publications (127) based on the citations and the study’s aims. Additional criteria, including (i) publication year: 2000 to 2024; (ii) search type: journals; (iii) document type: articles; and (iv) language: The outcomes were confined to English, resulting in 103 journal articles (Ruiz-Real et al., 2021). With an emphasis on the most significant scientific tools and methodologies used, as well as the most significant results and conclusions drawn by the authors (Berradi et al., 2020). Finally, it is crucial to identify the unexplored areas in this field and focus future research on filling these gaps. The process of analysing scientific publications and contributions relies heavily on the collection of data and the choice of research methods. This part has introduced the effective bibliometric tool VOS Viewer version 1.6.18, as well as database selection and data collection, as well as the establishment of numerous factors to ensure the reliability of research. We follow Goodell et al. (2021) procedure for bibliometric reviews:(1) establishing the review’s aims and scope; (2) selecting the analysis tools; (3) collecting the data for analysis; and (4) analysing and reporting the findings.(5) scope for future research. The software VOS viewer 1.6.18 is used to analyse co-authorship, inter-country, and keyword co-occurrence; it is a tool for creating network maps based on the network analysis database. This software is open access and freely downloadable (https://www.vosviewer.com/downloads/VOSviewer_1.6.20_exe.zip). In addition, these maps can also be displayed (Zhang et al., 2019).

Analysis and discussions

The years 2000 to 2023 were selected for this study since there are a plethora of published works on sustainable finance inside this time frame. In addition, this period is characterized by the concept’s rise to prominence on some kind of worldwide scale and, commencing in 1994, a lack of emphasis on green finance and sustainability. Again it’s an indication that Zhang et al. (2022) green finance investment and technological innovation improve renewable energy efficiency and sustainable development goals. The results (Figure 1) demonstrate a significant surge in the prevalence of articles published on green finance for sustainability from 2018 to 2023, indicating that the research field has been receiving a massive number of academic interests with a consistent increase in publication. The high growth in the number of publications from 20 in 2018 to 45 in 2019 and more than 100 in 2021 suggests that green finance for sustainability has become a topic of academic interest, and that the worldwide momentum of investing in green finance is the economic engine of this development. In addition, Lee et al. (2022) the recent rise in interest may have been sparked by a demand from environmental activists and the availability of information to discover and capitalise on ecological and sustainability opportunities.

Figure 1. Showing the number of publications based on the year (Source Scopus database).

Analysis of active contributors (countries and institutions)

This analysis is vital to the geographical distribution of research on green finance for sustainability and refers to the number of industry trends and breakthroughs in specific domains. Consequently, a country-level analysis of the research on green finance for sustainability could provide valuable insights into the level of green finance development within these financial ecosystems. The countries that contributed to research on green finance for sustainability during the study period are outlined in Table 1.

Table 1. Showing the top 30 countries based on citation.

Sr. No.	Id	Country	Documents	Citations	Total link strength
1	82	United States	64	1030	44
2	81	United Kingdom	45	944	43
3	10	China	75	815	59
4	35	Italy	31	330	13
5	47	Netherlands	10	277	14
6	52	Pakistan	16	273	26
7	23	France	15	262	27
8	36	Japan	10	259	13
9	27	Hong Kong	13	257	5
10	65	Singapore	6	248	9
11	44	Malaysia	19	246	19
12	2	Australia	13	225	10
13	69	South Korea	5	175	3
14	70	Spain	17	166	18
15	76	Taiwan	6	160	5
16	7	Brazil	12	150	11
17	24	Germany	20	139	22
18	63	Saudi Arabia	6	124	14
19	30	Indonesia	15	109	13
20	75	Switzerland	7	84	7
21	55	Philippines	3	83	3
22	25	Ghana	4	72	5
23	6	Belgium	9	71	7
24	9	Canada	10	69	15
25	58	Portugal	3	65	5
26	77	Thailand	4	62	2
27	45	Mexico	2	55	2
28	74	Sweden	8	55	5
29	29	India	18	49	6
30	57	Poland	5	47	2

In addition, Figure 2 depicts the prominent institutions from which at least two scholars have contributed to the study of green finance for sustainability. Hong Kong Polytechnic University is ranked first, while the London School of Economics and Political Science has emerged as a leading contributor to green finance for sustainability. London School of Economics and Capital University of Economics and Business tied for second place.

Figure 2. Showing the publications based on the affiliation (Source Scopus database).

On the basis of documents, Figure 3 and Figure 4 depicts the contribution of various major countries to green finance for sustainability, with China ranking first, followed by the United Kingdom and the United States, and then Italy, Germany, Malaysia, India, Spain, Pakistan, and France in that order.

Figure 3. Showing the country wise overlay visualization clustering (Author Compilation through Vos viewer).

Figure 4. Showing the number of publications based on the Country (Source Scopus database).

Analysis of author, sources, and documents

Figure 5 depicts the co-authorship network with various shades. The colour of an object is determined by the cluster to which it belongs. Lines between objects indicate connections. There are three distinct groups of various colours in Figure 5. These colours indicate the relationships between the authors. In this study, we investigated how these three groups of authors collaborated. Each object in the network visualization is represented by its name and, by default, a circle. A large circle indicates the extent of an author’s contribution to a related field. While picture 6 illustrates the co-authorship overlay clustering of the data, blue cluster reflect the research done on green finance for sustainability before 2015 and the green colour denotes the time period between 2018 and 2020, and the colour yellow describes research carried out beyond the year 2020.

Figure 5. Showing the authorship network clustering (Author Compilation through Vos viewer).

A categorization of the available document sources is shown in Figure 6. The significant research on green finance for sustainability has indeed been published in sustainability Switzerland, Journal of cleaner production, Journal of sustainable finance and investment, and climate policy, and after 2021, it has been advanced by Environmental science and Pollution research.

Figure 6. Showing the publications based on the sources (Source Scopus database).

This survey was the focus of a study that was subsequently written up and distributed in a range of categories, including journal articles, book chapters, conference proceedings, books, editorial remarks, short surveys, and so on. The vast majority of researchers working in the topic of green finance for sustainability have published their most recent findings in publications. This percentage is at 63.5 percent. According to Figure 7, there have been 14.5% of conference papers, 9.4% of book chapters, 7.0% of review articles, and 1.6% of book chapters, etc. Figure 8 presents a classification of the many subjects under investigation. The majority of the papers that have been published on green finance for sustainability are related to fields such as environmental science, social science, business management, economics, and energy, among other related fields. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that a multidisciplinary approach is taken in various aspects of green finance for sustainability. This study makes it easier to have a systematic and all-encompassing grasp of green finance for sustainability links with other fields and offers potential for research in the future in a variety of different domains.

Figure 7. Showing the publications based on the type (Source Scopus database).

Figure 8. Showing the publications based on the subject (Source Scopus database).

Co-occurrence of authors’ keywords and most cited articles

This part additionally investigates the content in terms of keywords, which is a useful tool for discovering relevant literature and trends. In this phase of the inquiry, VOS viewer software is used to analyse the co-occurrence of the authors’ keywords to explain the characteristics of publications in green finance, and the results are presented in Table 2. Note that the keywords assessed here are based on the content of the publications’ keywords. Figure 9 illustrates the frequency with which a keyword appears with other keywords and exemplifies the use of keyword analyses in identifying current trends and subject-area patterns. Current research can be extended to keyword analysis to discover unidentified themes and domains in the literature. Obviously, it is hard to predict which topics may garner more interest in the future. The co-occurrence of the phrases, however, leads us to anticipate that the current trend will continue.

Table 2. Showing the most occurrences keyworks.

Sr. No.	Keyword	Occurrences	Total link strength
1	Sustainability	168	884
2	Sustainable Development	150	929
3	Finance	112	705
4	Green Finance	67	258
5	Climate Change	45	295
6	Investments	44	367
7	Environmental Economics	34	228
8	Sustainable Finance	34	151
9	Green Bonds	31	135
10	Green Economy	31	224
11	China	27	172
12	Economics	26	202
13	Investment	26	213
14	Environmental Sustainability	25	151
15	Environmental Protection	24	169
16	Commerce	19	148
17	Energy Efficiency	19	142
18	Environmental Impact	19	122
19	Planning	19	138
20	Environmental Management	18	109
21	Economic Growth	17	113
22	Economic Development	16	125
23	Environmental Policy	16	127
24	Financial Performance	16	97
25	Renewable Energy	16	147
26	Carbon Emission	15	127
27	Decision Making	15	116
28	Energy Policy	15	154
29	Innovation	15	129
30	Economic and Social Effects	14	95

Figure 9. Showing the keywords Network (Author Compilation).

As we have discussed that the sustainable finance refers to a financial system that is oriented toward long-term and sustainable economic activity, with environmental and social aspects being carefully considered during the investing process. Although climate financing and eco-conservation finance are intertwined, their priorities differ. Climate finance focuses on preventing climate change, whereas conservation finance focuses on ecological conservation. They are both green financing and part of what is recognized internationally as sustainable development finance, as represented in Table 3.

Table 3. Shows the most cited Articles published in Journal.

Authors	Title	Year	Source title	Cited
Wedding G.C., Crawford-Brown D.	Measuring site-level success in brownfield redevelopments: A focus on sustainability and green building	2007	Journal of Environmental Management	151
Pan S.-Y., Gao M., Kim H., Shah K.J., Pei S.-L., Chiang P.-C.	Advances and challenges in sustainable tourism toward a green economy	2018	Science of the Total Environment	145
Geels F.W.	The impact of the financial-economic crisis on sustainability transitions: Financial investment, governance, and public discourse	2013	Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions	143
Feng M., Yu W., Wang X., Wong C.Y., Xu M., Xiao Z.	Green supply chain management and financial performance: The mediating roles of operational and environmental performance	2018	Business Strategy and the Environment	125
Zhang D., Mohsin M., Rasheed A.K., Chang Y., Taghizadeh-Hesary F.	Public spending and green economic growth in BRI region: Mediating role of green finance	2021	Energy Policy	120
Lam P.T.I., Law A.O.K.	Crowdfunding for renewable and sustainable energy projects: An exploratory case study approach	2016	Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews	100
Nassani A.A., Aldakhil A.M., Qazi Abro M.M., Zaman K.	Environmental Kuznets curve among BRICS countries: Spot lightening finance, transport, energy and growth factors	2017	Journal of Cleaner Production	98
Lenferink S., Tillema T., Arts J.	Towards sustainable infrastructure development through integrated contracts: Experiences with inclusiveness in Dutch infrastructure projects	2013	International Journal of Project Management	92
Gianfrate G., Peri M.	The green advantage: Exploring the convenience of issuing green bonds	2019	Journal of Cleaner Production	89
Singal M.	The Link between Firm Financial Performance and Investment in Sustainability Initiatives	2014	Cornell Hospitality Quarterly	81
Criscuolo C., Menon C.	Environmental policies and risk finance in the green sector: Cross-country evidence	2015	Energy Policy	80
Flammer C.	Corporate green bonds	2021	Journal of Financial Economics	75
Newton P., Meyer D.	Exploring the attitudes-action gap in household resource consumption: Does "Environmental Lifestyle" segmentation align with consumer behaviour?	2013	Sustainability (Switzerland)	75
Owen R., Brennan G., Lyon F.	Enabling investment for the transition to a low carbon economy: government policy to finance early-stage green innovation	2018	Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability	71
Nikolaeva A., Adey P., Cresswell T., Lee J.Y., Nóvoa A., Temenos C.	Communing mobility: Towards a new politics of mobility transitions	2019	Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers	64
Ng T.H., Tao J.Y.	Bond financing for renewable energy in Asia	2016	Energy Policy	63
Orsato R.J., Garcia A., Mendes-Da-Silva W., Simonetti R., Monzoni M.	Sustainability indexes: Why join in? A study of the 'corporate sustainability index (ISE)' in Brazil	2015	Journal of Cleaner Production	61
Agyabeng-Mensah Y., Afum E., Ahenkorah E.	Exploring financial performance and green logistics management practices: Examining the mediating influences of market, environmental and social performances	2020	Journal of Cleaner Production	60
Falcone P.M., Morone P., Sica E.	Greening of the financial system and fuelling a sustainability transition: A discursive approach to assess landscape pressures on the Italian financial system	2018	Technological Forecasting and Social Change	60
Jiang M.P., Tovey K.	Overcoming barriers to implementation of carbon reduction strategies in large commercial buildings in China	2010	Building and Environment	59
Tolliver C., Keeley A.R., Managi S.	Drivers of green bond market growth: The importance of Nationally Determined Contributions to the Paris Agreement and implications for sustainability	2020	Journal of Cleaner Production	55
Ng A.W.	From sustainability accounting to a green financing system: Institutional legitimacy and market heterogeneity in a global financial centre	2018	Journal of Cleaner Production	55
Rezende L.D.A., Bansi A.C., Alves M.F.R., Galina S.V.R.	Take your time: Examining when green innovation affects financial performance in multinationals	2019	Journal of Cleaner Production	54
Sroufe R., Gopalakrishna-Remani V.	Management, social sustainability, reputation, and financial performance relationships: An empirical examination of U.S. firms	2019	Organization and Environment	54
Diwekar U.	Green process design, industrial ecology, and sustainability: A systems analysis perspective	2005	Resources, Conservation and Recycling	52
Baah C., Jin Z., Tang L.	Organizational and regulatory stakeholder pressures friends or foes to green logistics practices and financial performance: Investigating corporate reputation as a missing link	2020	Journal of Cleaner Production	50
Pueyo A.	What constrains renewable energy investment in Sub-Saharan Africa? A comparison of Kenya and Ghana	2018	World Development	50
Loftus A., March H.	Financializing Desalination: Rethinking the Returns of Big Infrastructure	2016	International Journal of Urban and Regional Research	50
Tang A.K.Y., Lai K.-H., Cheng T.C.E.	A Multi-research-method approach to studying environmental sustainability in retail operations	2016	International Journal of Production Economics	43
Cui H., Wang R., Wang H.	An evolutionary analysis of green finance sustainability based on multi-agent game	2020	Journal of Cleaner Production	42
Hishan S.S., Sasmoko, Khan A., Ahmad J., Hassan Z.B., Zaman K., Qureshi M.I.	Access to clean technologies, energy, finance, and food: environmental sustainability agenda and its implications on Sub-Saharan African countries	2019	Environmental Science and Pollution Research	42
Gliedt T., Hoicka C.E.	Energy upgrades as financial or strategic investment? Energy Star property owners and managers improving building energy performance	2015	Applied Energy	42
Bertone E., Sahin O., Stewart R.A., Zou P.X.W., Alam M., Hampson K., Blair E.	Role of financial mechanisms for accelerating the rate of water and energy efficiency retrofits in Australian public buildings: Hybrid Bayesian Network and System Dynamics modelling approach	2018	Applied Energy	40

We present a list of these titles to illustrate the current topics in the area. The most cited articles and prolific authors which have more than 100 citations are: Measuring site-level success in brownfield redevelopments (Wedding & Crawford-Brown, 2007), Advances and challenges in sustainable tourism toward a green economy (Pan et al., 2018), The impact of the financial-economic crisis on sustainability transitions (F W Geels, 2013a), Green supply chain management and financial performance (Feng et al., 2018), Public spending and green economic growth in BRI region (D Zhang et al., 2021), Crowdfunding for renewable and sustainable energy projects (Lam & Law, 2016). Consequently, the vacuum can be filled by expanding on the new theme. The content presented in this paper could be used as a catalyst for future research. After reviewing the study’s results with previous findings, we could identify a research agenda that remains. New studies in econometrics, corporate finance, and sustainability are needed to explore this further. Thus, it has proven to be highly valuable and has grown in relevance through green finance for sustainability.

Conclusion

In the past three years, a vast number of experimental research has been conducted on green finance for sustainability, as demonstrated by this study. If we discuss the research questions in this study we must begin with the journal of sustainability Switzerland, Journal of cleaner production, Journal of sustainable finance and investment, and climate policy, and after 2021, it has been advanced by Environmental science and Pollution research. We discover that the most frequent keywords for themes, which are Sustainability, Sustainable Development, Investments, Environmental Economics, Sustainable Finance, Green Bonds, and Green Economy. In the study of green finance for sustainability, China seems to have the strongest bibliometric linkages with other countries, followed by the United States and the United Kingdom. The paper’s focus was the analysis of bibliometric data on green finance for sustainability. Researchers in this field are still in their infancy, and there remain several potential prospects, including the gap identified in these findings. In recent years, environmental problems have enormously pressured businesses and the public sector to take part in regular discussions, mainly on financial viability, which profoundly affects the growth of the corporate. Green financing aims to boost financial flows (from banking, micro-credit, insurance, and investment) to sustainable development priorities. A fundamental aspect of this is better managing environmental and social risks, taking chances with a good return and environmental benefit, and delivering greater responsibility. Green money supports climate change mitigation, adaptation, and environmental goals including water management, biodiversity, and landscape conservation. The primary function of green finance is to offer the financial mechanisms and tools required to fulfil environmental protection objectives. To achieve environmental protection goals and effective green investments, we must overcome challenges such as “greenwashing,” pricing, forecasting, and modelling of financial instruments and tools, selecting the most efficient or effective tool, making green finance more appealing to investors, and changing investor behaviour towards more environmentally friendly practices. The study concluded that green finance policies from banks are influenced by environmental and climate change policies, interest rates, religion, risks, social inclusion, and social justice, and banking regulations.

Limitations

Only papers from the Scopus database have been used in the study, resulting in a blending of research keywords. Many scientific publication databases, including PubMed, Web of Science, and Google Scholar, are not examined by it. These databases might even be considered in future studies.

Ethics and consent

Ethics and consent were not required.