How do energy consumption, globalization, and income inequality affect environmental quality across growth regimes?

This paper investigates the impacts of renewable and nonrenewable energy consumption, income inequality, and globalization on the ecological footprints of 49 countries for the period of 1995-2018. Panel cointegration test reveals a long-run relationship between the variables. Long-run parameter estimates derived from AMG and CCEMG, increasing income and nonrenewable energy consumption, have a significant positive impact on the ecological footprint, while countries that consume more renewable energy have seen an improvement in the quality of the environment. Conversely, neither income inequality nor globalization has a significant effect on national EFs. Evidence from the estimation of the panel threshold error correction model, where GDP growth is used as the transition variable, indicates a significant threshold effect, which supports a nonlinear relationship among the variables by identifying two distinct growth regimes: lower and upper. For the estimation sample, the positive and significant parameter estimates for economic growth in both growth regimes do not support the EKC hypothesis. The results indicate that renewable and nonrenewable energy consumption has a larger impact on the EF in the upper than lower growth regime. The threshold estimates are in line with the linear long-run estimates that do not indicate that income inequality has a significant impact on ecological footprint. However, globalization appears to negatively affect environmental quality in the lower growth regime.

Testing the environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis in the transport sector for OECD countries: a dynamic panel threshold approach.

This study tests the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis in the transport sector for 28 OECD countries from 1990 to 2019. As a novelty, the relationship between gross domestic product (GDP) and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from the transport sector is investigated with the estimation of the dynamic panel threshold regression based on the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator by Seo and Shin (Seo and Shin, J Econom 2:169-186, 2016). This approach enables us to test EKC and capture possible nonlinearities between variables. Along with the analysis of the EKC hypothesis, our study also investigates the effects of road petroleum products consumption, renewable energy consumption, and trade openness on transport CO2 emissions. The threshold regression results, where GDP per capita is employed as the transition variable, support the nonlinear relationship between CO2 emissions from the transportation sector and GDP by rejecting the null hypothesis of no threshold effect. This finding indicates the existence of two different regimes, i.e., the lower and upper regimes, based on the optimum value of the GDP per capita. Economic growth damages the environment in the lower regime, whereas it improves environmental quality in the upper regime. Therefore, the results indicate the presence of an inverted U-shaped relationship and support the EKC hypothesis in the OECD transportation sector. As a result, it is concluded that achieving sustainable economic growth is critical for investing in environmentally friendly technologies required to achieve the goal of reducing transportation-related CO2.

Time-varying impact of income and fossil fuel consumption on CO2 emissions in India.

This paper investigates the time-varying effects of fossil fuel consumption on CO2 emissions in India utilizing the time-varying cointegration test, allowing for multivariate long-run time-varying cointegration parameter developed by Bierens and Martins (2010) and the time-varying vector autoregressive (TVP-VAR) model developed by Primiceri (2005). The long-run time-varying coefficients reveal that GDP has a positive and increasing impact on CO2 emissions over time. Moreover, results confirm the polluting effects of all fossil fuels. Besides, the TVP-VAR model findings also demonstrate that changes in income and fossil fuel consumption have a positive and significant impact on environmental degradation. Coal is found to be the most polluting fuel, followed by oil consumption. Furthermore, the time-varying responses show that increased natural gas consumption has the least influence when compared to other fossil fuels on CO2 emissions.

The relationship between FDI, CO2 emissions, and energy consumption in Asia-Pacific economic cooperation countries.

This paper investigates the relationship between CO2 emissions, energy consumption, economic growth, and foreign direct investment for a sample of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Countries (APEC) countries from 1981:Q1 to 2021:Q1 employing panel data methodology. We identify cross-sectional dependence and hence utilize the cross-sectional augmented Dickey-Fuller panel unit root test for appropriate estimation. The cointegration test developed by Westerlund (2008) reveals a long-run equilibrium between CO2 emissions, energy consumption, economic growth, and foreign direct investment. Long-run parameter estimates based on Common Correlated Effect Mean Group indicate that an increase in FDI inflows has a negative impact on air quality, supporting the pollution haven hypothesis. The cointegration test results also show that the impact of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on CO2 emissions varies by country in the estimation sample. In contrast to the mixed evidence on the effects of other variables, the increase in energy consumption is positively and significantly affecting CO2 emissions in all APEC countries. Emirmahmutoglu and Kose Econ Model 28:870-876, (2011)'s panel causality test results show a bidirectional relationship between FDI and CO2 emissions in Japan. Furthermore, there is a bidirectional causal relationship between GDP and energy consumption in Australia, China, Japan, and Singapore. Overall, empirical evidence suggests that APEC countries should adhere to strict regulations and invest in environmental-friendly clean technologies to attract foreign direct investment.