Role of artificial intelligence on green economic development: Joint determinates of natural resources and green total factor productivity

The energy consumption structure is now shifting from using fossil fuels to using renewable energy. Thus it is crucial to research if decreasing energy use can genuinely boost green total factor productivity (GTFP) and how to reconcile the link between reducing energy consumption and GTFP using various technical approaches. This study proposes the two-way influence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and natural resources market on GTFP. It comprehensively evaluates the effects of AI on green economic development using the instance of China and a pertinent mathematical model. We found that the impacts of AI on carbon intensity vary between industries and developmental phases. Compared to the 11th Five-Year Plan, AI significantly reduced carbon intensity during the 12th. Compared to capital-intensive businesses, labor- and technology-intensive industries likely have a more significant drop in carbon intensity due to AI and natural resources market.

Energy Demand Trends during COVID-19 Pandemic

COVID-19 pandemic lock-downs have led to the biggest fall in energy demand in over 70 years while also having an immense effect on the current energy mix. This study overviews the impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on the UK energy demand by analysing the associated electricity generation mix before and during COVID-19 pandemic. This analysis uses open-access data that is publicly available on the Official Carbon Intensity API for Great Britain. The scope of this paper is two-fold: first, to provide an overview of the lock-down measures in electricity demand and generation across the world, and second to identify the impact of lock-down restrictions on the British energy generation mix. It can be seen from the results that electricity generation by fossil fuels and renewable energy sources has shown opposite trends while the share of the later increased significantly during the lockdown period. © 2022 EUROSIS-ETI.

A Strategic Response to Disruption in the Crude Oil Industry: Insights from Contemporary Literature

The current spike in crude oil prices due to the Russia Ukraine war notwithstanding, the international crude oil industry value chain is witnessing a fundamental strategic shift in recent times. A variety of factors is causing this shift, including the automobile industry's inching towards a slow but gradual Electric Vehicle future coupled with extraordinary consumer behavior exhibited by millennial and post-millennial consumers- where apart from being carbon-footprint sensitive, they move from ownership of assets (including cars) to sharing economy. In addition to that the uncertainties thrown by COVID-19 impact the crude demand-supply dynamics and put pressure on crude oil prices, thus posing significant challenges for the industry. A comprehensive review of current literature has been undertaken to identify a framework that suggests a strategic response to tackling disruption in the global crude oil industry. Patterns emerging from some refining hubs indicate some initial response to the challenges faced by the international crude oil industry, especially in the light of lowering demand from conventional consumers. The refineries value chain of the oil industry is gearing up to redesign its product mix to tackle this. Crude oil industry players are slowly but gradually making investments in the renewable energy industry. Moreover, the crude oil exploration and production industry is also to reap the benefits of leveraging Information and Communications Technology (ICT) for business optimization to ensure a systematic sustainable future for them.

Estimating the European CO2 emissions change due to COVID-19 restrictions.

The carbon dioxide variations generated by the socio-economic restrictions imposed by the management of the COVID-19 crisis are analysed in this paper for 23 European countries and 10 economic sectors. By considering the most up to date information on GDP and carbon intensity of production, this paper represents one of the first attempts to estimate the CO2 emissions change that have taken place in Europe during the first six months of 2020. Results show that more than 195,600 thousand tons of CO2 have been avoided between January and June 2020, compared to the same period of the previous year, representing a -12.1% emissions change. The largest reductions have taken place in the Manufacturing, Wholesale, Retail Trade, Transport, Accommodation and Food Service sectors, accounting for more than 93.7% of total CO2 change. Spain, Italy and France have been the most affected areas with -106,600 thousand tons emissions drop. In line with the results provided by previous studies, this paper highlights that the geographical and the sectoral distribution of the CO2 emissions change has been largely influenced by the magnitude of the COVID-19 impacts. In addition, the carbon intensity of production, characterizing the most affected economic activities, has been the main element of differentiation compared to the previous 2008 crisis. By providing preliminary estimation of the CO2 emissions change that have taken place across geographical and sectoral activities, this paper contributes to the existing climate policy debate and can support future estimation of CO2 variations both in a context of confinement release as well as in a context of reintroduced COVID-19 restrictions.

Preventing a rebound in carbon intensity post-COVID-19 - lessons learned from the change in carbon intensity before and after the 2008 financial crisis.

The carbon emission rebound of the post-2008 financial crisis teaches us a lesson that avoiding a rebound in carbon intensity is key to prevent the carbon emission increase afterward. Although how carbon emission will change the world after the COVID-19 pandemic is unknown, it is urgent to learn from the past and avert or slow down the potential rebound effect. Therefore, this study aims to identify key drivers of carbon intensity changes of 55 sectors, applying the decomposition techniques and the world input-output data. Our results demonstrate that global carbon intensity fluctuates drastically when shocked by the global financial crisis, presenting an inversed-V shape for the period 2008-2011. Industrial carbon emission and gross output vary among different industries, the growth rate of industrial carbon intensity varies from -55.55% to 23.77%. The energy intensity effect and economic structure effect have opposite impacts on carbon intensity decrease, accelerating and hindering the decreasing carbon intensity, respectively. However, the energy mix effect has a minor impact on carbon intensity decrease. The industrial carbon intensity decomposition results show the impact of technological and structural factors are significantly different among industries. Moreover, the impact of energy intensity is slightly stronger than the energy mix. More measures targeting avoiding the rebound in carbon intensity should be developed.