Tourism subindustry level environmental impacts in the US

Abstract

ABSTRACT Trends indicate that the tourism and hospitality (TH) industry is significantly contributing to the socio-economic conditions of the economies worldwide. However, TH-led economic development is attained at the cost of environmental pollution. This research explores four TH subindustries’ impacts on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and air pollutants in the US. We also considered energy consumption, economic growth, and globalization to normalize TH subindustries’ environmental impacts. The ARDL bounds test approach is applied on a quarterly (2005-2019) time-series data to analyze TH environmental impacts. The findings uncovered that food and drink places (FSDP) contribute higher to GHG (CO2, CH4, N2O) emissions in the long-run than the rest of the subindustries. Compared to the other subsectors, the accommodation (AC) sector contributed higher to air pollutants (CO, NH3, NOx, SO2, VOC, and PM2.5). All the four subindustries positively contribute to energy consumption; however, FSDP, amusement, gambling, and recreation (AGR) subindustries consume higher energy levels. Economic growth has mixed impacts on GHG emissions and air pollutants. Interestingly, globalization shows negative impacts on GHG emissions and air pollutants. Granger causality results show that FSDP, AC, AGR, and performing arts and sports subindustries cause PM2.5. Key implications and policy initiatives are provided.