A Review of Economic and Environment Indicators and Energy Efficiency: Evidence from the EU and Serbia

Dynamic and causality interrelationships from municipal solid waste recycling to economic growth, carbon emissions and energy efficiency using a novel bootstrapping autoregressive distributed lag

Introduction. The study of the development of CO2-neutral economy shows that this concept was only examined from a theoretical point of view in the first phases and has become a priority development area of all countries of the world since 2019. Carbon neutrality means not only a massive conversion of traditional energy into renewable (alternative), but also a complete thermal modernization, a change in the production sector towards energy saving and energy efficiency, innovative changes in wastewater treatment systems and recycling, etc. In other words, an important engine for the development of a CO2-neutral economy in the national economic system is a set of mechanisms and instruments to improve energy efficiency through sustainable innovative development. Theoretical base. For a detailed analysis of the conditions for the development of the energy efficiency of the national economy (Charles, 2019), it is necessary to monitor the state of the energy system and the environmental situation in the country (Huang, 2019), since today almost all countries of the world have reconsidered their priority areas in the development of the energy sector and have actively started to implement reforms for modernization and conversion towards energy production (Khan, 2018). The most promising areas were alternative energy sources and the development of a carbon-neutral economy (Jiahai, 2019). Therefore, the countries of the European Union have agreed on an action plan for energy efficiency for the period 2007-2020 (Kraemer, 2020), which is a 20-20-20 plan - reducing CO2 emissions by 20%, improving energy efficiency by 20% and increasing the share of renewable sources in the energy sector by 20% (Lakshman, 2019). In this phase, Russia plans to achieve 11% of renewable energy sources in the structure of final energy consumption and increase energy efficiency by 9%. At the same time, Russia, which has joined the Paris Climate Agreement (Rehbein, 2020), has set itself the goal of reducing CO2 emissions by 40% by 2030 compared to 1990 (Shu, 2019). The aim of the study is to develop theoretical and methodological tools for assessing the level of energy efficiency of the national economy and its main determinants. Results. The forecast results showed that there is a significant discrepancy between the optimistic and realistic scenarios of the dynamics of changes in the economy’s diverging sub-index of energy efficiency. According to the optimistic scenario, the balancing of the convergent and divergent sub-indices will take more than 10 years (in 2020, the value of the convergent sub-index of energy efficiency of the national economy was 0.84 and the projected value of the divergent sub-index in 2030 was 0.71). Conclusions. The growth of the economy’s integral energy efficiency index is possible if a stable balance is achieved between its convergent and divergent determinants. Calculations have confirmed that the implementation of state policies to ensure the energy efficiency of the economy should primarily focus on increasing divergent determinants of the energy efficiency of the economy. To target the diverging sub-index of the national economy’s energy efficiency, the paper performs a scenario forecast of the vector of its change based on the Brown model, which takes into account the retrospective nature of the distribution of its time series and eliminates fluctuations in random variables.

This study comprehensively considers any input and output that has a certain physical dimension, utilizes the super slacks-based measure directional distance function data envelopment analysis (DDF-DEA) model to measure global energy performance in the period 2010–2016, and compares regional differences in Americas, Europe and Asia. We employ contained directional, non-directional, and undesirable inputs and outputs, which include population number, fossil fuels energy consumption, gross capital formation, gross domestic product, renewable energy consumption, and carbon dioxide emission. From the full energy efficiency and ranking of the DDF-DEA approach herein, the empirical results show that Trinidad and Tobago exhibits the best efficiency (2.8194) and Uzbekistan has the worst efficiency (0.5734). The best regional energy performance is Americas, and the worst is Asia for 2010–2016, showing that regional energy policies have a significant impact. The Environmental Performance Index is an important sustainable environment index, and most Environmental Performance Index levels are quite consistent with the trend of energy efficiency and ranking with DDF-DEA in this study. The energy efficiencies of the higher Environmental Performance Index group and higher renewable energy consumption group are significantly larger than the lower Environmental Performance Index group and better than the lower renewable energy consumption group, respectively. Therefore, we suggest that all countries should adjust their future energy using a strategy based on annual Environmental Performance Index. Their goals can be to reduce fossil fuels energy consumption, increase renewable energy use, and reduce undesirable output of carbon dioxide. Doing so will help them to develop their economies while taking into account a sustainable environment, thus achieving sustainable economic development.

The impact of energy efficiency on carbon emissions: Evidence from the transportation sector in Chinese 30 provinces

The energy efficiency of the Russian economy lags far behind that in the developed countries of the world. The enhancement of the energy efficiency and, first of all, the energy saving, is the source that can provide an additional economic growth through organizational and technical measures. The object of research is the economy of the Irkutsk region, whose energy efficiency increase is of particular relevance due to the high energy intensity of the economy. The study aims to perform an energy-economic analysis of the Irkutsk region and to make a forecast of the increase in the energy efficiency of the economy. A methodological approach proposed for the research is based on balance and statistical methods. The research involves the development of retrospective energy balances of the Irkutsk region and the calculation of energy efficiency indicators on the basis of these balances. Moreover, based on the statistical methods, the equation of the energy-GRP ratio is devised. The forecast for the energy and economic development of the Irkutsk region is made, the forecast energy balances are developed, based on them, the energy intensity of the regional GRP is calculated for the long term, and measures to increase the energy efficiency are proposed.

Removing energy allocation distortion to increase economic output and energy efficiency in China

Based on VAR model, the effects of economic growth, industrial structure and energy efficiency on Jilin province’s carbon emission have been analyzed. It is found out that economic growth and energy efficiency change in the opposite direction of carbon emission, while industrial structure changes in the same direction of it, which are main reasons for carbon emission growth. According to this, government should apply its “green function” so as to adjust industrial structure, improve energy transformation and energy efficiency.

The analysis of the economic efficiency of agriculture has been the subject of numerous studies. An economically efficient agricultural sector is not always environmentally efficient. Agriculture is a large emitter of greenhouse gases. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states that food production and agriculture are responsible for 21–37% of total global CO2 emissions. Due to the comprehensive assessment of the agricultural efficiency, it is worthwhile to apply to its measurement an integrated approach based on economic, energy and environmental aspects. These aspects were the main reasons for undertaking this research. The purpose of the study was to determine the economic, energy and environmental efficiency of agriculture in the EU Member States in 2019. The environmental analyses relate to the period 1990–2019. A total of 26 member states of the European Union (excluding Malta and Luxembourg) were selected for research. The sources of materials were Eurostat and the European Environmental Agency. This study was based on the Data Envelopment Analysis method, and used the DEA model focused on minimizing inputs. The research also adopts energy productivity and greenhouse gas emission efficiency indicators. The DEA model features the following variables: one effect (value of agricultural production) and four inputs (land, labour, use of fertilizers and use of energy). It was found that seven out of the 26 studied EU countries have efficient agriculture. The efficient agriculture group included The Netherlands, Denmark, Greece, Cyprus, the United Kingdom, Italy and Ireland. Based on the DEA method, benchmarks have been defined for countries with inefficient agriculture. On the basis of these benchmarks for inefficient agricultural sectors, it was possible to determine how they could improve efficiency to achieve the same results with fewer inputs. This issue is particularly important in the context of sustainable agricultural development. In the next stage of the research, the analysis of economic and energy efficiency was combined with the analysis of GHG emission efficiency in agriculture. Four groups of countries have been distinguished: eco-efficiency leaders, eco-efficiency followers, environmental slackers, eco-efficiency laggards. The leaders of the classification were The Netherlands, Italy, Greece, Cyprus and Portugal.

Pursuing a net-zero carbon future for all: Challenges for commercial real estate

Analysis of regional energy economic efficiency and its influencing factors: A case study of Yangtze river urban agglomeration

The world is facing enormous challenge of climate change and global warming due to increased emission level. In order to overcome such challenges, economies are adopting energy efficient techniques to control the carbon emissions and improves environmental sustainability. This study analyses the influencing factors of environmental quality from a global perspective throughout the last three decades. In this regard, advanced time series approaches are used to identify the association between factors such as economic growth, energy efficiency (E.N.E.F.), and carbon emissions – covering global data over the period 1990Q4–2020Q4. From the time series methods, this study observed the stationarity of all variables at first difference. The empirical outcomes also validates the long-run equilibrium relationship between the variables. Due to asymmetric distribution of the variables, this study uses the novel Quantile-on-Quantile (Q.Q.) regression approach, which reveals that increasing economic growth harms environmental quality by increasing the carbon emissions level. However, E.N.E.F. is a prominent factor of environmental sustainability, that reduces the level of carbon emissions in the atmosphere. Employing the pairwise Granger causality test, this study observed the unidirectional causality from economic growth to carbon emissions, while a two-way causal nexus is found between economic growth – E.N.E.F. and E.N.E.F. – carbon emissions. Based on the empirical results, this study suggests that economic growth should be regulated in a sense that it contribute towards the improvement of E.N.E.F., which ultimately leads to reduce the emissions level and promote environmental sustainability.

This paper analyzes the time-varying impacts of Chinaʼs economic growth, energy efficiency, and industrial development on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from 1970 to 2019. First, we examined and found that there are two significant structural changes in the CO2 sequence over the years, and there was a significant nonlinear relationship among the four. The first nonlinear structural model constructed is the TVP regression model. According to the Bayesian model comparison criterion, TVP-SV-VAR was selected as the second constructed model from four types of VAR models containing nonlinear structures. The results show that the conduction intensity value of energy use efficiency to CO2 emissions has increased year by year, from 0.45 in 1971 to 0.97 in 2019. The short-term transmission mechanism of energy use efficiency to carbon emissions is the most significant. The conduction intensity of Chinaʼs economic growth on CO2 emissions increases year by year. Chinaʼs economic growth plays a major role in long-term CO2 emission reduction. The impact of industrial development on CO2 emissions reached a peak of 0.34 in 1977, and the intensity of the impact has basically stabilized at 0.26.

The demand for energy has been increasing significantly worldwide. Consequently, carbon emissions have accelerated, since energy usage involves carbon dioxide. Given that the available energy has quantitative restriction feature, efficient usage of energy becomes crucial. Energy efficiency is expected to improve over time with technological advancements. However, the adoption of low-carbon energy technology caused by the growing concern about carbon emissions may actually offset energy efficiency, owing to the higher cost compared with traditional energy methods. We conducted a stochastic frontier analysis to examine energy efficiency in the views of both economic and ecological aspect view during 1995–2016 for 21 emerging countries selected from Morgan Stanley Capital International, using energy consumption, economic complexity index and the other factors of production based on the Cobb-Douglas production function. Mexico was identified as one of the most energy-efficient countries; however, Mexico could not be classified as real energy efficient, as it demonstrated the highest carbon inefficiency level. We also categorized countries demonstrating increased economic energy efficiency and decreased carbon inefficiency as frontier country, and identified six such countries.

یکی از مسائل پیش روی جوامع جهانی در دهه های اخیر، مباحث مربوط به محیط زیست و عوامل تخریب آن است. آلودگی هایی که به تغییرات شدید آب و هوایی و گرم شدن کرۀ زمین منجر شده، نگرانی های زیادی را در سطح منطقه ای و جهانی ایجاد کرده است. از سوی دیگر با وجود محدودیت منابع و ضرورت توسعه در کشورهای کمتر توسعه یافته، توجه به مبحث کارایی به عنوان یک راه حل در حوزۀ بحران های زیست محیطی، اهمیت خود را نمایان می‌سازد. نظر به اهمیت مسائل زیست محیطی در کنار مباحث مربوط به رشد و توسعۀ اقتصادی، در تحقیق حاضر سعی شده است از بعد کارایی انرژی، به این مهم پرداخته شود. به این منظور در این پژوهش، اثر متغیرهای شدت انرژی (به عنوان یکی از شاخص های رایج کارایی انرژی)، جمعیت، ثروت (درآمد سرانه) و مصرف انرژی بر انتشار دی-اکسیدکربن (به عنوان شاخص کیفیت محیط زیست) به روش داده های تابلویی طی دوره 1996-2010 مورد بررسی قرار گرفت. آزمون های مربوط به اثرات فرد و زمان و نیز آزمون هاسمن وجود یک الگوی اثرات تصادفی یک جانبه را برای انتشار دی اکسیدکربن در کشورهای مورد بررسی تأیید کرد. نتایج تحقیق نشان می دهد جمعیت، ثروت، مصرف انرژی و شدت انرژی، همگی اثری مثبت و معنی دار بر انتشار دی اکسیدکربن دارند. هم چنین ضریب بالای متغیر اصلی مورد بررسی (شدت انرژی) میزان اهمیت توجه به کارایی انرژی در حوزۀ محیط زیست را تأیید می کند.

Measuring energy economic efficiency: A mathematical programming approach