Asymmetric Impact of Renewable Energy Consumption on Environment in Pakistan

Abstract

Although the current literature has widely explored the paraphernalia of renewable energy on environment, the literature overlooks the asymmetric association of renewable energy with the environment. To contribute this gap in the existing body of related literature, this study carry out the nonlinear impact of renewable energy consumption along with control variables like non-renewable energy, urbanization, and gross domestic product on CO2 emission in Pakistan. The study employs the nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag model (NARDL) from 1980 to 2018. The results reveal that renewable energy consumption mitigates the environmental degradation asymmetrically. While other variables non-renewable energy consumption, gross domestic product and urbanization positively associated with Co2 emissions. The study gives some guidance for policymakers of Pakistan that should formulate policies and regulations to promote renewable energy usage which mitigates environmental degradation.