Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews Submission Guide

Source: Clarivate JCR 2024, Elsevier editorial disclosures (accessed April 2026).

Source: RSER author guidelines.

Use this page when deciding:

• whether the proposed review has an original organizing structure

• whether the scope justifies comprehensive treatment

• whether reference coverage is comprehensive

• whether quantitative synthesis tables are sufficient

• how the review distinguishes from recent RSER coverage

• a clear original taxonomy, framework, or quantitative synthesis structuring the review

• comprehensive reference coverage of foundational and recent state-of-the-art papers

• comparison tables organizing the literature by technology, performance, cost, or geographical scope

• a discussion of open challenges and future research directions

• a cover letter establishing the original organizing contribution

Across Manusights submission reviews for energy reviews, the single feedback that consistently lands at first round at RSER is a request to add quantitative comparison tables. Editors look for normalized comparisons of efficiency, cost per kWh, lifecycle emissions, or geographical deployment statistics. Reviewers consistently observe that purely qualitative reviews of renewable-energy technologies fail to support the kinds of policy or technology-roadmap conclusions readers expect from RSER.

The pattern we see most often is authors who survey 200 papers narratively without organizing the data into a comparable table; that is the gap that turns a 20-30 page submission into a 4-week revision cycle.

• Literature review without original taxonomy.

• Scope overlap with recent RSER pieces.

• Missing quantitative synthesis.

• Narrow specialist focus.

RSER is Elsevier's flagship renewable-energy review journal.

Original organization expected: RSER reviews must contribute taxonomy, framework, or quantitative synthesis.

The 3-5 year topic-timing window: RSER editors check the journal's recent issues.

Quantitative emphasis: RSER reviews typically include performance comparisons, cost trajectories, or lifecycle analysis tables.

The strongest RSER cover letters establish:

• the original taxonomy or framework in one sentence

• the comprehensive scope

• the quantitative synthesis included

• distinction from recent RSER pieces

Before submitting to Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, a Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews submission readiness check identifies whether the package meets the editorial bar before you commit to the submission.

RSER requires these at first submission:

• Cover letter explicitly establishing the original organizing taxonomy or quantitative synthesis that justifies this as a Review rather than a literature summary

• RSER Author Checklist (the journal's own GFA-defined checklist) submitted alongside the cover letter

• Declaration of competing interests for all authors

• Generative AI usage declaration covering manuscript preparation and figure generation

• Ethics statement for any work involving human subjects, stakeholder interviews, or policy-evaluation participants

• Data availability statement with repository links for systematic-review search records, datasets, or modeling code

• Code availability statement for any quantitative-synthesis or meta-analysis code used in the Review

• Manuscript within the approximately 15,000-word limit for reviews (main text plus table content plus figure captions; references typically excluded from the count)

• CRediT author contributions statement

• Four or more suggested reviewers with no recent collaboration history

For RSER submissions, the most common artifact-related issue is missing the RSER Author Checklist. Elsevier intake reviewers flag this explicitly; submissions without the GFA checklist alongside the cover letter are commonly returned for revision before scope screen. The second most common issue is incomplete systematic-review methodology documentation in the data availability statement (search-string transparency and PRISMA-style flow diagrams are expected for any quantitative-synthesis Review).

For Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews submissions, the editorial timeline runs through four phases. The most consistent rejection trigger surfaces in the scope screen: literature-review framing without an original organizing taxonomy or quantitative synthesis.

Day 0 to 5: Editorial Manager intake and editor assignment

Elsevier intake handles format compliance plus the RSER Author Checklist and AI-declaration checks. The handling Editor assignment lands within 5 days; energy reviews route to subject editors matching the renewable-energy subfield (solar, wind, biomass, hydrogen, storage, smart grids, energy policy). The most common Day 0-5 hold-up: missing checklist or single-column layout violations (Word submissions in double-column format).

Day 5 to 21: Editor scope and synthesis-rigor screen

RSER's editor filter prioritizes Reviews that contribute an original organizing taxonomy or quantitative synthesis, not Reviews that summarize the literature. The most common Day 5-21 desk reject in our review work: literature-review framing without an original synthetic contribution, and submissions covering fossil-fuel technologies that fall outside the journal's renewable-and-sustainable scope (even fossil-fuel efficiency improvements are generally out of scope unless part of a transition or hybrid system).

Week 3 to 12: Peer review

Standard 3-4 reviewers, 6-8 week first decision target. Reviewer mix typically includes one renewable-energy domain expert plus one synthesis-methodology specialist. Submissions missing systematic-review methodology documentation (PRISMA-style flow diagrams, search-string transparency) extend reviewer dialogue by 4-6 weeks.

Week 12 to 28: Decision, revision, and production

Major revision is the standard first decision at RSER. Revision rounds typically settle at 2 (rarely 3 for accepted papers). Total submission-to-acceptance: 6-10 months for accepted papers. Hybrid open-access option available with APC at acceptance.

• Is Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews a good journal?

• Energy & Environmental Science submission guide

Before upload, run your manuscript through an RSER taxonomy and reference-coverage readiness check.

This page handles the public submission rules; the draft still needs a journal-specific fit check. The review tells you whether your paper clears the Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews fit check before upload, especially around literature review framing without original organizing structure, scope overlap with recent RSER pieces, and missing quantitative synthesis. Paid Manusights reviews include a 60-day money-back guarantee, and we do not train models on submitted manuscripts.

Across Manusights submission reviews for renewable-energy reviews targeting RSER, three patterns generate the most consistent rejections.

Manusights pre-submission pattern analysis shows many RSER rejections trace to literature-review framing without original organization. The same pattern analysis often finds these cases involve scope overlap with recent RSER pieces. A related pattern is that these cases often arise from missing quantitative synthesis.

Literature review framing without original organizing structure

RSER editors look for taxonomy, framework, or quantitative synthesis. We observe submissions framed as "comprehensive review of [topic]" without original contribution routinely rejected. SciRev community data on RSER consistently shows the original-structure requirement as the dominant filter.

Check literature review framing without original organizing structure before submitting to Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews →

Scope overlap with recent RSER pieces

Editors check the journal's recent issues. We see submissions on topics covered in RSER within 3-5 years routinely rejected unless a clearly distinct angle is articulated.

Check scope overlap with recent rser pieces before submitting to Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews →

Missing quantitative synthesis

RSER reviewers expect comparison tables, cost analyses, or lifecycle data. We find that purely qualitative reviews are routinely returned with quantitative-synthesis requests. A RSER taxonomy and reference-coverage readiness check can identify whether the package supports a submission.

Clarivate JCR 2024 bibliometric data places RSER among top energy review journals. SciRev author-reported data confirms 4-8 week first-decision windows.

Check missing quantitative synthesis before submitting to Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews →