Reinvigorating the environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis in the context of  highly polluted nations: evidence using advanced panel estimation techniques

Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2023 Sep 8. doi: 10.1007/s11356-023-29237-7. Online ahead of print.ABSTRACTChina, United States, India, Russia, and Japan are regarded as the top five carbon dioxide-emitting nations in the world. These countries altogether account for more than half of the global annual discharges of carbon dioxide. Consequently, impeding the carbon emission-led environmental adversities in these countries is of critical emphasis for establishing environmental sustainability worldwide. In this regard, this study checks how economic progress, energy use intensification, and renewable energy use affect the annual growth rates of per capita carbon dioxide emission in these highly-polluted economies considering the study period from 1990 to 2021. Besides, for analytical purposes, advanced panel data estimation techniques have been utilized for detecting and neutralizing the impacts of cross-sectional dependency and slope heterogeneity-related problems in the data. Overall, the findings endorse that economic progress deteriorates environmental quality both in the short and long run. However, since the long-run unfavorable environmental impacts of economic growth are relatively lower compared with the short-run impacts, the environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis can be deemed valid. Besides, more intensive use of energy resources is witnessed to impose negative long-run environmental consequences while the adoption of renewable energy instead of fossil fuels is found to...
Source: Environmental Science and Pollution Research International - Category: Environmental Health Authors: Source Type: research