The paper investigates resource, technical, economic and market potential of solar energy and its ecology and economic efficiency in Azerbaijan. The authors have distinguished six regions in the territory of Azerbaijan with different levels of solar radiation. The resource potential of the regions is calculated by the AutoCad program. As well, technical and economic potential was calculated by special methodology. The authors concluded that Azerbaijan has so much solar energy resource potential and it is possible to replace traditional carbon types of energy with solar energy, even by using the modern technical equipment. However, it is impossible because of economic disadvantages and very low electricity prices. The price of 1 kWh electricity from carbon fuels is several times cheaper than 1 kWh electricity from solar energy. That is why it is difficult to attract investments to develop solar power. There is a necessity to develop a new electricity price policy to stimulate attractiveness of solar power for households and industry.

The objective of the article was to examine the level of diversification of the energy balance and energy export demand, as well as its impacts on economic growth to ensure energy security in Azerbaijan. Forthe research, the Risk Energy Export Demand Index and its four sub-indexes, i.e.,1) export dependence, were used; 2) risk of monopsonium; (3) the risk of transaction costs; 4) Comparative quantitative assessment of the economic importance of different types of energy in the country's energy exports. The Herfindahl-Hirschman index and the Shannon-Wiener index were used for the assessment of the diversification and concentration rate. The OLS method, the ADF test and cointegration were used to assess the relationship between indicators. It is concluded that the share ofenergy obtained from renewable sources in the country's energy balance is very low (about 3%), and the energy obtained from these sources is mainly used for electricity production. Since an essential part of the country's energy balance is in hydrocarbon reserves, the level of diversification is low.