Gateway to Environmental Sustainability: Energy Related Risk, Institutional Quality, and Renewable Energy Transition Toward <scp>SDGs</scp> 7, 13, and 16 in the <scp>G7</scp> Economies

ABSTRACT The worldwide transition to a low‐carbon economy, guided by ESG criteria and the SDGs, has heightened the need for a renewable energy transition and sustainable environmental development. Nevertheless, energy‐related risks such as energy price fluctuations, energy supply interruptions, geopolitics, and policy uncertainties still pose problems in ensuring energy security and climate change resiliency among G7 countries. In terms of ESG criteria, high‐quality institutions and governance are vital for encouraging renewable energy use and environmental sustainability. In this study, we analyze whether good governance and institutions guarantee energy risk protection and promote the use of renewable energy in G7 economies using data from 1996 to 2023. Based on Institutional Theory and the Risk–Resilience Framework, we employ a novel quantile‐on‐quantile regression (QQR) technique that demonstrates distributional and asymmetric effects, with supportive evidence from bidirectional analysis and interaction modeling of institutional quality. We detect considerable heterogeneity: Japan and Germany show uniform positive correlations between renewable take‐up and energy related risk, whereas the United Kingdom, Italy, and the United States exhibit mixed or adverse effects at some quantiles. These findings reiterate that robust, reactive institutions are central to transforming energy‐market risks into low‐carbon, secure futures and outline policy recommendations for secure energy transitions specifically tailored to advanced economies.