Towards achieving status of green economy in OECD countries: Articulating the role of nuclear energy, greenfield investment and environmental taxation

Abstract

In today's era, the green economy has become the central focus worldwide, along with the clean energy transition. Unfortunately, the current economic development model flourishes at the expense of the natural environment and ecosystems. Thereby, the concept of green economy gets immense attention among scholars and policy analyst. Most countries are dependent on energy import due to limited and unsustainable natural resource use. In this context, environmental taxation can play a key role in restricting the unsustainable use of natural resources, and nuclear energy can reduce energy import dependency, helping to shift from conventional growth to green economic growth. In this context, this study is an attempt to explore the relationship between nuclear energy, environmental taxation, greenfield investment, and the green economy in a panel of 16 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) economies from 2000 to 2019. To get empirical estimate the study relies on Method of Moment Quantile Regression (MM-QR) approach. Interestingly, this study found that nuclear energy development discourages green economic growth across all quantiles in OECD countries. Furthermore, the study found that environmental taxation helps OECD countries achieve green economy status. Greenfield investments are another factor promotes the green economy. Climate policy measures are suggested in line with increasing share of nuclear energy in energy mix through greenfield investment in energy sector.