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• Scandinavian countries are fostering a sustainable economy based on renewable energy. • The investments on renewable sources has positively affected the investments in this energy and GHG emissions. • A bidirectional causal relationship exists between renewable energy consumption and CO 2 emissions. • A causal relationship exists between renewable energy consumption and economic growth. Climate change presents the greatest challenge facing all countries of the world in the new millennium. Among others, objective 13 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aims at adopting urgent measures to contrast climate change and its consequences. Part of the decline in the global growth of emissions has been the increase in using renewable energies. In this context, the relationship among GDP, CO 2 emissions, and renewable energy use has been investigated in this study, starting from a systematic review that has noticed the presence of three clusters focused on: CO2 emissions, GDP, and energy consumption. Despite the current level of interest in examining the relationship among these variables, there have been few empirical studies. To fill this knowledge gap, this paper has been focused on the Scandinavian countries, where the use of renewable energies has steadily increased, developing novel panel analysis estimates. Using a dataset of these five economies over a 1990–2018 time period, several panel data tests have been carried out, in order to robustly assess the causality issue among renewable energies, CO 2 emissions, and GDP. The results of the empirical analysis imply that renewable energy consumption is a useful policy instrument to reduce CO 2 emissions without adversely affecting GDP growth. The main implications have been that the decrease of CO 2 emissions, by increasing renewable energy use, can guarantee high levels of energy efficiency and economic growth. These empirical findings help design innovative energy policy roadmaps and accelerate the ecological transition through the promotion of renewable energy and the reduction of GHG emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]