Economic Emission Research Articles

Optimal scheduling of combined cooling, heating, and power microgrid based on a hybrid gray wolf optimizer

ABSTRACT This study aims to reduce economic cost and pollutant emissions of microgrid while satisfying the loads demand and system constraints. A combined cooling, heating and power microgrid model is established integrated with photovoltaic power generation unit and energy storage system. A hybrid grey wolf optimizer is proposed by introducing chaos strategy, mutation strategy and levy strategy into grey wolf optimizer to deal with the shortcomings of mathematical methods and original intelligent optimization methods in microgrid optimal scheduling. The proposed method is verified from a case study and compares with the original grey wolf optimizer. The hybrid grey wolf optimizer reduces the daily economic cost, environmental cost and comprehensive cost of microgrid system by 9.9 $, 34.3 $ and 20.27 $, with the reduction rates of 1.20%, 10.99% and 3.27%. This study is beneficial for alleviating environmental pollution and energy crisis, and promotes economic production and sustainable development.

Economic Complexity, Economic Growth, and CO2 Emissions: A Panel Data Analysis

ABSTRACT Reducing global warming effects without jeopardizing economic prosperity demands the analysis of the link between these factors. Environmental degradation and economic growth are thought to be related in a non-linear manner, following an inverted-U pattern called the ‘Environmental Kuznets Curve’ (EKC). Despite the many studies seeking empirical support for this relationship, the literature does not provide conclusive findings. By presenting the Economic Complexity Index (ECI) as an explanatory variable, this paper aims at providing a comprehensive analysis of EKC from 86 countries with different development levels, covering the period between 1971 and 2014. Different statistical estimation techniques were used, including an Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS) model, dynamic panel data techniques, and the Sasabuchi–Lind–Mehlum (SLM) test. The results show no clear evidence supporting the idea of EKC, neither for production volumes nor for production sophistication, as captured by ECI. Nonetheless, when ECI increases, pollution levels drop monotonously only for developed countries.

Biodiesel Production Using Modified Direct Transesterification by Sequential Use of Acid-Base Catalysis and Performance Evaluation of Diesel Engine Using Various Blends

Biodiesel is a seemingly suitable alternative substitute for conventional fossil fuels to run a diesel engine. In the first part of the study, the production of biodiesel by modified direct transesterification (MDT) is reported. An enhancement in the biodiesel yield with a considerable reduction in reaction time with the MDT method was observed. The required duration for diesel and biodiesel blending was minimized including glycerol separation time from biodiesel in the MDT method. The development in the automotive sector mainly focuses on the design of an efficient, economical, and low emission greenhouse gas diesel engine. In the current experimental work Ceiba pentandra/Nigella sativa and diesel blends (CPB10 and NSB10) were used to run the diesel engine. A variety of approaches were implemented to improve the engine performance for these combinations of fuels. The fuel injector opening pressure (IOP) was set at 240 bar, the torriodal re-entrant combustion chamber (TRCC) having a six-hole injector with a 0.2 mm orifice diameter each, provided better brake thermal efficiency (BTE) with lower emissions compared with the hemispherical combustion chamber (HCC) and trapezoidal combustion chamber (TCC) for both CPB10 and NSB10. CPB10 showed better performance compared with NSB10. A maximum BTE of 29.1% and 28.6% were achieved with CPB10 and NSB10, respectively, at all optimized conditions. Diesel engine operation with CPB10 and NSB10 at 23° bTDC fuel injection timing, and 240 bar IOP with TRCC can yield better results, close to a diesel run engine at 23° bTDC fuel injection timing, and 205 bar IOP with HCC.

Modeling the environmental implications of car ownership and energy consumption in the UK: Evidence from NARDL model

We investigated the asymmetric effects of energy consumption, car ownership and tourism activities on CO2 emissions in the UK. Empirical results from the Non-Linear Autoregressive Distributed Lag (NARDL) model reveal that in the UK, only car ownership has asymmetric effects on emissions with a magnitude of −1.428% (positive) and 10.108% (negative) shocks that highlight the impact of car ownership on emission level in UK while rising energy consumption and GDP have symmetric positive impacts on emissions, and tourism has a negative impact on emissions. Furthermore, on causality analysis, we found a unidirectional causality runs from GDP per capita to car ownership, and that car ownership and tourism both causes energy consumption in a one-way relationship. Apart from encouraging environmentally friendly energy sources to reduce carbon emission in the UK, the short and long-run analyses disclose that economic expansion and energy consumption increase carbon emission. Empirical results also offer a new perspective on the ascending relevance of electric cars in UK. Hence, only policies that discourage the use of carbon emission inputs in the process of production should be encouraged. Electric vehicles seem to be more efficient when compared to combustion engines because most energy put in the battery is used to drive the cars and wastes less energy when they are driven in cities. This can be achieved by increasing tariffs and decreasing quotas on internal combustion-powered cars. Subsequently, promote and increase usage of electric vehicles that reduce greenhouses

Prioritizing greenhouse gas mitigation strategies for local governments using marginal abatement cost

Abstract Cities and other subnational jurisdictions have emerged as key agents for plans and policies to mitigate global climate change, with many presenting their strategies through climate action plans (CAPs). A critical review of CAPs from local government jurisdictions in California found that many CAPs lacked quantitative information on the economic cost and emissions reductions of proposed strategies, precluding decision-making based on the cost-effectiveness of competing policies. In response, this study develops a framework for comparing strategies based on their life cycle emissions mitigation potential and life cycle costs in a marginal abatement cost curve (MACC) to allow for side-by-side comparison. This framework was piloted with the cooperation of two California counties, Yolo and Los Angeles, to analyze six strategies in the transportation sector: intercity bike lanes, installation of roundabout intersections, alternative pavement rehabilitation, electric bus fleet, alternative fuel city fleet and installation of solar canopies in parking lots. Applying the life cycle approach revealed strategies that had net cost savings over their life cycle, indicating there are opportunities for reducing emissions and costs (roundabout intersections and solar canopies). The life cycle accounting processes also revealed that some emissions reduction strategies in fact increased emissions relative to no action (intercity bike lanes and alternative pavement rehabilitation). Despite the attractiveness of a life cycle-based MACC to support local government decision-making, there is the mismatch between a life cycle perspective and the annual emissions accounting used in most CAPs and associated policies. Future work should explore how to marry the life cycle and annual accounting methods and incorporate other sustainability concerns, such as equity and environmental justice, to support local decision-making.

Considering Source-Charge-Storage Multiple Time Scale Cooperative Control Strategy

In order to achieve the optimization of power consumption mode, improve user power efficiency, and realize the coordination of power supply and demand, considering the advantages of distributed energy and energy storage, a source-charge-storage multi-time-scale coordinated control strategy is proposed. According to the needs of the hybrid energy system, we analyze the complementary potential of the hybrid energy system from the output side and analyze the response priority mechanism of the integrated energy system equipment, taking the economic cost and pollutant gas emissions as the objective function, economy, environment, and system. This is a constrained source-load-storage multiobjective joint optimization and adjustment model, which is solved by a multi-time-scale cooperative control strategy. Finally, a calculation example is used to verify the feasibility of the proposed method and provide technical support for the coordinated and optimized operation of “source-load-storage.”

CO2 emissions and energy technologies in Western Europe

In this paper, we investigate the path to the green transition in Europe. In so doing, we implement an empirical model of dynamic panel data on a sample of sixteen Western European countries over the period 1980 to 2019. The model is consistent with various features of neoclassical growth theory incorporating energy use. Our focus is on the short-run determinants of carbon emissions within that set of countries. We provide evidence that the relationship between economic activity and CO2 emissions is strong in economies where economic booms depend on energy-intensive sectors. Also, the mitigating role of renewable energy technologies is key when energy intensity rebounds. These circumstances may constitute a challenge for the climate transition goals targeted in the EU’s Recovery Plan, whose main objective at this very moment is to mitigate the economic and social impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Comprehensive analysis of carbon emissions, economic growth, and employment from the perspective of industrial restructuring: a case study of China

Industrial restructuring is a significant measure for low-carbon transition. In principle, carbon emissions can be effectively reduced by limiting the output of high-emission sectors; however, the socio-economic effects of the sectors should also be considered. Moreover, owing to the limitations of the method or data, the interactions between households and production sectors have been neglected in the study of industrial restructuring, resulting in an incomplete and potentially biased understanding of the role of households. To fill this gap, we applied a semi-closed input–output model to identify key sectors by economic and emission linkages and measure the employment impacts (direct, indirect, and induced) of reduced carbon emissions. The empirical results for China in 2010–2018 showed that relatively small changes in key emission sectors would significantly affect the economic growth, and reduced carbon emissions reduction would generally lead to high job losses. Promoting labor-intensive sectors, particularly the service sector, is conducive to achieving a “multi-win” situation for economic development, carbon emission reductions, and stable employment. Furthermore, our results highlight the significance of households: expanding consumption and increasing household income can bring multiple benefits, such as economic growth, job creation, and low carbon emissions. These findings can provide useful information for identifying the optimized path of restructuring and helping achieve the sustainable development of the environment, economy, and society.

Analysing Nexus between Economic Growth, GHG Emissions, and Energy Consumption for India

Rising greenhouse gas emissions is an important issue of the current time. India’s massive greenhouse gas emissions is ranked third globally. The escalating energy demand in the country has opened the gateway for further increase in emissions. Recent studies suggest strong nexus between energy consumption, economic growth, and carbon emissions. This study has the objective to empirically test the aforementioned interdependencies. The co-integration test and multivariate vector error correction model (VECM) are used for the analysis and the Granger Causality test is used to establish the direction of causality. The time-series data for the period of 1971–2011 is used for the analysis. The results of the study confirm strong co-integration between variables. The causality results show that economic growth exerts a causal influence on carbon emissions, energy consumption exerts a causal influence on economic growth, and carbon emissions exert a causal influence on economic growth. Based on the results, the study suggests a policy that focuses on energy conservation and gradual replacement of fossil fuels with renewable energy sources, which would be beneficial for the environment and the society.

Research on the effect of clean energy development on regional economic growth and carbon dioxide emissions from the perspective of regional differences

Research on the effect of clean energy development on regional economic growth and carbon dioxide emissions from the perspective of regional differences

Associate professor of economics, Ibb University, Yemen

Abstract This study investigates the validity of the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis in Yemen and the causal relationships between Carbon dioxide emissions, per capita income, energy consumption, trade openness, and industrial share to GDP. ARDL bounds testing approach to cointegration, Error Correction Model, and Toda-Yamamoto procedure to Granger causality techniques were employed on annual data covering the period from 1990 to 2010. long run relationship between CO2 emissions and its determinants with significant effects for per capita GDP and trade openness, whereas, energy consumption and trade openness appear to be important determinants of CO2 emissions in the short run. Besides, based on Narayan and Narayan (2010) approach, it is found that the EKC hypothesis does not hold in Yemen and therefore the effect of per capita income on CO2 emissions is monotonically increasing. Toda-Yamamoto causality test proved the existence of bidirectional causal relationships between economic growth and CO2 emissions, between energy consumption and economic growth, and between trade openness and energy consumption

Economic Growth, Industrialization, Trade, Electricity Production and Carbon Dioxide Emissions: Evidence from Ghana

The study scrutinized correlation between electricity production, trade, economic growth, industrialization and carbon dioxide emissions in Ghana. Our study disaggregated trade into export and import to spell out distinctive and individual variable contribution to emissions in Ghana. In an attempt to investigate, the study used time-series data set of World Development Indicators from 1971 to 2014. By means of Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) cointegrating technique, study established that variables are co-integrated and have long-run equilibrium relationship. Results of long-term effect of explanatory variables on carbon dioxide emissions indicated that 1% each increase of economic growth and industrialization, will cause an increase of emissions by 16.9% and 79% individually whiles each increase of 1% of electricity production, trade exports, trade imports, will cause a decrease in carbon dioxide emissions by 80.3%, 27.7% and 4.1% correspondingly. In the pursuit of carbon emissions’ mitigation and achievement of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 13, Ghana need to increase electricity production and trade exports.

Offshore Wind Replaces Coal and Reduces Transmission, Enabling China to Meet the 1.5°C Climate Imperative

Offshore Wind Replaces Coal and Reduces Transmission, Enabling China to Meet the 1.5°C Climate Imperative

Does tradeoff between financial and social indicators matters in environmental consideration: evidence from G7 region.

The study tries to discover the impact of financial and social indicators' growth towards environmental considerations to understand the drivers of economic growth and carbon dioxide emissions change in G7 countries. The DEA-like composite index has been used to examine the tradeoff between financial and social indicator matters in environmental consideration by using a multi-objective goal programming approach. The data from 2008 to 2018 is collected from G-7 countries. The results from the DEA-like composite index reveals that there is a mixed condition of environmental sustainability in G-7 countries where the USA is performing better and Japan is performing worse among the set of other countries. The further result shows that the energy and fiscal indicators help to decrease the dangerous gas emissions. Divergent to that, the human and financial index positively contributes to greenhouse gas emissions. Fostering sustainable development is essential to successfully reduce emissions, meet established objectives, and ensure steady development. The study provides valuable information for policymakers.

Relationship between economic diversification and CO2 emissions: ARDL-EC modeling in South Africa

ABSTRACT Economic diversification transforms an economy to utilize multiple sectors for growth. The problem is that developing countries have been slow in shifting away from mineral-energy complex-based development. However, sector-heterogeneity either reduces or increases exposure and/or adaptive capabilities to greenhouse gas emissions. The objective of the study was to ascertain the relationship between economic diversification and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in South Africa. The study utilized the autoregressive distributed lag-error correction model (ARDL-ECM) and included macroeconomic variables such as gross domestic product (GDP), population, foreign direct investment and trade balance. The Tress Index of 10 industries was utilized to measure economic diversification. Annual data from 1993 to 2020 were used in the study. The study found that in the short run, CO2 Granger caused economic diversity but in the long run, there was no association. Population also had a long- and short-run relationship with economic diversification, while CO2 emissions had a long- and short-run relationship with GDP. The study concludes that there is a unidirectional causality between economic diversification and CO2 emissions in the short run and no relationship in the long run. Economic diversification should be considered in national, economic and climate change policies of the country.

Energy, Economic, and GHG Emissions Assessment of Biomass and Solar PV Systems for an Industrial Facility

Energy, Economic, and GHG Emissions Assessment of Biomass and Solar PV Systems for an Industrial Facility

Dynamic evaluation method of urban green growth level in Anhui province: a comprehensive analysis of 16 cities’ panel data from 2013-2017

Considering that green growth development is an increasingly important environmental trend, this paper develops an urban green growth development index and applies it to Anhui Province in China and its 16 cities. Previously, such analyses have taken place mostly at the provincial level, and research on cities is relatively rare. To fill the gap, this paper constructs an urban green growth economy evaluation index based on economic technology, social development, ecological environment, and energy emissions. Using the vertical and horizontal pull-off method to comprehensively evaluate the green growth development levels of 16 cities in Anhui province from 2013 to 2017, the residual expectation coefficient is used to measure and analyze differences in the development levels. The results show that Hefei and Huangshan emit a medium-high level of carbon, and the other 14 cities belong in the high-carbon category. Furthermore, cluster analysis shows that the green growth development levels of the 16 cities fall into four groups. There is a wide disparity between the groups, and the differences between groups are significantly larger than the differences within groups.

Research on optimal allocation strategy of multi-energy storage in regional integrated energy system considering the quantification of low-carbon economic benefits

The dual pressure of energy crisis and environmental pollution has prompted the world’s energy sector to change in the direction of clean, efficient, sustainable and pollution-free, and RIES (Regional Integrated Energy System) has emerged. The deployment of energy storage devices in the RIES can deepen the connection of each energy system, release the spatial and temporal constraints of multiple energy sources, and thus improve the energy utilization and economy of the integrated energy system. Based on the infrastructure and model of the RIES, this paper studied the synergistic optimal configuration of electricity storage, power-to-gas (P2G) technology, cooling storage and heating storage in the case of multi-energy complementation operation of combined cooling, heating and power supply (CCHP) unit and other equipment. Firstly, an optimal configuration model of multiple energy storage in the RIES based on the optimal operational economy was proposed. Then, the economics and feasibility of configuring different energy storage combinations in the system were analyzed. Finally, the benefits of energy storage devices in the regional integrated energy system were quantified and analyzed by the economic indicators and low carbon emissions reduction indicators. By employing an industrial district RIES in northern China as the study case, the operation scheduling scheme and energy storage allocation scheme were solved by the optimization model proposed in this paper. The results show that the RIES containing multiple types of energy storage can consume more distributed new energy, improve economic efficiency and reduce carbon emissions. And this model has a good application prospect.

Trade Liberalization, Economic Growth and Environmental Quality Nexus: An Empirical Evidence from Pakistan

The linkage between trade liberalization, environmental quality and economic growth is becoming an increasingly popular issue in environmental economics in recent decades. In view of Pakistan’s position as one of the main contributors to carbon dioxide emissions in Asia, it is vital to identify the main determinants of carbon dioxide emissions. The present study empirically investigates the long run association among trade liberalization, environmental quality and economic growth along with other variables energy use and capital labor ratio in Pakistan for the period 1980-2018. The results also indicate that there is inverted U shape relationship between economic growth and carbon dioxide emissions, hence the environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis is valid in Pakistan during 1980-2018. Trade openness has a negative significant impact on carbon dioxide emissions. Capital labor ratio effects and energy use have a direct relationship with carbon dioxide emissions. The results show that environmental quality is first declined by economic growth but with further increase in growth, environmental quality is improved which supports the existence of Environmental Kuznet curve hypothesis in Pakistan during that time span. Furthermore, results also show that trade openness has positive significant impact on environmental quality.

Decoupling economic growth from emissions: the case of policies promoting resource substitution

The relationship between the economy and the environment is not straightforward and is influenced by a multitude of factors. Ideally, economic growth would not damage environmental quality and environmental protection would not hinder economic growth. Achieving this decoupling often requires environmental policy, but the analysis of specific policy instruments and their necessary levels to achieve it is rare. In this paper, we use a stylized equilibrium model to explore distinct policy instruments under which relative decoupling and absolute decoupling between economic growth and emissions occur. In our model, final-goods production uses polluting (non-renewable) and non-polluting (renewable) resources. The government taxes emissions and subsidizes renewables production. In the empirical application, we focus on the case of electricity generation. Results show that, with a growing subsidy, relative decoupling exists. Achieving absolute decoupling is harder, but it occurs for a certain interval of the subsidy growth rate. For that purpose, the choice of the tax and subsidy growth rates is more important than the choice of the initial levels for these instruments. The choice of the subsidy growth rate indicates the prioritization between the economy and the environment. A lower subsidy growth rate favors the environment, while a higher one favors the economy. The tax growth rate dictates the distance between the output growth rate and the emissions growth rate. The higher the tax growth rate, the higher the difference between them. In sum, the government can decide between attaining higher output growth rates, higher emissions decreasing rates, or an intermediate situation.