The Effect of Renewable and Nuclear Energy Consumption on Decoupling Economic Growth from CO2 Emissions in Spain

Mariola Piłatowska,Aneta Włodarczyk,Andrzej Geise

doi:10.3390/en13092124

Mariola Piłatowska, Aneta Włodarczyk + Show 1 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/en13092124

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Abstract

This study examines the relationship between renewable and nuclear energy consumption, carbon dioxide emissions and economic growth by using the Granger causality and non-linear impulse response function in a business cycle in Spain. We estimate the threshold vector autoregression (TVAR) model on the basis of annual data from the period 1970–2018, which are disaggregated into quarterly data to obtain robust empirical results through avoiding a sample size problem. Our analysis reveals that economic growth and CO2 emissions are positively correlated during expansions but not during recessions. Moreover, we find that rising nuclear energy consumption leads to decreased CO2 emissions during expansions, while the impact of increasing renewable energy consumption on emissions is negative but insignificant. In addition, there is a positive feedback between nuclear energy consumption and economic growth, but unidirectional positive causality running from renewable energy consumption to economic growth in upturns. Our findings do indicate that both nuclear and renewable energy consumption contribute to a reduction in emissions; however, the rise in economic activity, leading to a greater increase in emissions, offsets this positive impact of green energy. Therefore, a decoupling of economic growth from CO2 emissions is not observed. These results demand some crucial changes in legislation targeted at reducing emissions, as green energy alone is insufficient to reach this goal.

Highlights

Over the past two decades, countries around the world have been struggling to reduce global warming and avoid the dangerous consequences of climate change [1]
Energy on economic growth and carbon dioxide emissions in Spain for the period 1970–2018 by. These findings indicate that nuclear energy consumption and GDP are interdependent, i.e., nuclear applying the threshold vector autoregression (TVAR) model, causality analysis and non-linear energy consumption stimulates economic growth and vice versa
The context of economic development, empirical evidence indicates bidirectional causality between emissions and economic growth and in terms of global warming and climate change, the depletion fossil fuel-based in the upper regime, but no causality inofthe lower regime resources

Summary

Introduction

Over the past two decades, countries around the world have been struggling to reduce global warming and avoid the dangerous consequences of climate change [1]. Any attempt requires finding alternative energy sources to fossil fuels. Both nuclear and renewable (hydro, solar, wind, biomass and geothermal) energy sources could provide solutions to the problem of energy security and climate change [3,4,5]. The impact of renewable and nuclear energy consumption on GHG emissions may not be straightforward. Even if commissioning a new renewable or nuclear power plant caused the closure of a coal-fired power station, it could result in a lower price for coal, which, in turn, would encourage other energy consumers to burn it in place of cleaner energy sources, raising the level of CO2 emissions overall [4].

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