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This paper analyzes the economic, social and political three-dimensional driving effects of new energy substitution for fossil energy under the joint action of market, government and international competition from three perspectives: profit motive, mutual benefit and responsibility motive, combined with the relevant data of 78 countries from 1965 to 2021. The results show that fossil energy prices and energy security positively influence the process of new energy substitution, and environmental pollution negatively affects the process of new energy substitution, and the pushback effect of energy security on new energy substitution is more significant in the study interval, indicating that at the beginning of the new energy revolution, global environmental governance and willingness to reduce emissions drive the development of new energy industry, but the “carbon emission reduction” of each country has increased the complexity of new energy substitution, especially in some developed countries in taking responsibility for global environmental governance divergent views. Further heterogeneity analysis reveals that each country’s energy strategy affects the degree of substitution of “quality” and “quantity” of new energy, and the speed, areas and corrective ability of new energy development vary among countries under different strategic choices.

Energy and electricity are critical prerequisites for every nation and critical components of social and economic growth. The monetary policy economist has been debating the issue of relying on core inflation or headline inflation, which includes energy, because the energy price is so volatile that it obscures the trend in inflation and dilutes the objectives of monetary policy. This paper aims at analyzing the impact of the twin deficit on energy inflation within a linear and nonlinear framework in India using time series data covering the period from 1971 to 2021. ARDL and NARDL approaches are employed to investigate the linear/symmetric response of energy inflation due to the twin-deficit in India. Estimates show a negative relationship between the twin-deficit and energy inflation in a symmetric model. The results of the asymmetric model reveal that the response of energy inflation due to expansionary fiscal policy (increment in CFD) and contractionary fiscal policy (decline in CFD) is diverse, in terms of size of the coefficient. Further, estimates of NARDL show the distinct impact of increases and decreases in CAD on energy inflation. The study offers several implications for policymakers and energy economists.

Based on contingency and agency insights, this study examines the influence of ownership characteristics on performance measurement systems (PMSs) and outcome-based compensation systems driven by differences in organizational goals and objectives between state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and non-state-owned enterprises (non-SOEs) in Vietnam. The influence of ownership characteristics on the design of PMSs received little attention from researchers so far. Moreover, the few studies that are available so far only examined the relationship between firm ownership characteristics and the presence and use of economic performance indicators and economic outcome-based compensation in firms. In this study, the scope of PMSs is broader, and sustainability indicators focusing on community programs, ethical behavior, and government regulation are included in addition to economic based indicators. Analyzing survey data with the use of partial least squares (PLS) structural equation modeling (SEM), we find that the higher the share of the government in an organization’s capital is, the significantly more governmental duty indicators and significantly fewer ethical indicators and economic indicators are included in the PMS and outcome-based compensation systems. The inclusion of community indicators is not associated with firm ownership characteristics. Meanwhile, non-SOEs include significantly more economic value indicators, but no societal measures, like ethical, community-oriented, and governmental duty indicators.

The rapid growth of agriculture has led to a significant increase in energy utilization and CO2 emissions. Agriculture performs a pivotal role in improving every country’s economy. The current study has the main objective to analyses the long-run impact of agricultural CO2 discharge on economic growth, energy consumption (electricity utilization in the agriculture sector), financial development, foreign direct investment (FDI), and population for India. For the period 1978–2018, we applied ADF, PP, ERS, and KPSS unit root and Z&A and CMR structural interval tests to evaluate the stability and breaks in the data set. We check the cointegration of study variables through ARDL, Engle–Granger, and Johansen’s cointegration approaches. The findings of the long-run analysis showed a cointegration among the variables, which reveals that an escalation in economic growth and financial development refine the natural environment, while the upsurge in FDI and population further deteriorate the climate in India. However, agricultural sector electricity use shows an insignificant association with CO2 emissions for both periods. On the basis of results, we recommend that legislators should offer an environment that provides opportunities for financial development and economic growth.

China faces growing environmental problems as rapid economic growth comes at the cost of excessive resource consumption. Sustainable development can only be realized by reducing energy intensity. Although some general factors that influence energy intensity have been described, less information is available to compare energy intensity in different regions. Here we use existing literature to assess the effects of three internal factors (economic structure, energy consumption structure, and technological progress) on energy intensity in three regions of China. We use panel data from 2000 to 2009 and find that the effects of each factor differ in each region. We further differentiate these effects by decomposing technological progress into three parts using the DEA-Malmquist approach. We find three components of technological change have completely different effects in each region. Furthermore, these findings are applied to propose relevant suggestions to reduce energy intensity in different regions of China.

Abstract City has always been a concentrated area of consumption and pollution in a country or region. Solutions to the dematerialization of city would exert a profound impact on the entire socio-economic system. And the issue of resources and environment in Beijing, the center of China’s politics, economy, and culture, becomes a focus of attention both domestically and internationally. In this paper, we used the economy-wide material flow analysis to describe the socio-economic development and the current situation of resources and environment in Beijing during the period 1992–2015. Based on this, Tapio decoupling model and the logarithmic mean divisia index method were used to analyze the level and influencing factors of dematerialization in Beijing. The results of the study showed that: From 1992 to 2015, GDP of Beijing increased from 61.25 billion yuan to 623.45 billion yuan, at the same time, direct material input and domestic processed output also increased from 139.88 million tons and 78.63 million tons in 1992 to 205.17 million tons and 166.27 million tons in 2015 respectively. Judging from the change of the decoupling relationship between economic growth and resources and environment, the level of dematerialization in Beijing was continuously increasing. And the dematerialization level of resource consumption was slightly better than that of pollution discharge. The high expansion of population and economy was not conducive to the realization of dematerialization in Beijing. However, the decrease of the intensity of material utilization played a crucial role in the process of dematerialization in Beijing. Moreover, increases in material circulation and social overall level of cleaner production were beneficial to the realization of dematerialization.

© 2021 Elsevier LtdDespite extensive research to address the impact of environmental reforms under the Paris Climate Agreement, current literature has failed to provide sufficient insights into Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) countries. To this end, the current study attempts to address the impact of the economic complexity on environmental quality in the presence of renewable energy consumption, financial development, urbanization and energy innovation in RCEP countries from 1990 to 2019. Our empirical estimates confirm a significant association between environmental quality, economic complexity index, renewable energy consumption, financial development, urbanization and energy innovation in the short-run and long run. Based on extensive econometric analysis (CS-ARDL, AMG, PMG, FMOLS, and DOLS), we conclude that economic complexity, renewable energy, and energy innovation effectively mitigate environmental degradation. At the same time, financial development and urbanization have an adverse impact on the environment. These findings have extensive policy implications for policymakers and environmental stakeholders, who are aiming to achieve sustainable energy policy and economic growth to meet the environmental commitments under Paris Climate Agreement.

Abstract The rapid urbanization in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) area has aggravated the cross-regional pollution of PM2.5 and aroused concern about the conflicts between urban development and air quality. This study aims to examine the spatial-temporal PM2.5 variations in the BRI region, in which area many countries are undergoing rapid urbanization and the main field of future urbanization, to delineate the driving mechanism of PM2.5 accumulation or dissipation. Previous studies have analyzed the PM2.5 distribution at the national level, providing limited information regarding regional heterogeneity in urbanization and PM2.5 concentrations within each country. Additionally, the regional differences in the driving mechanisms of urbanization factors on PM2.5 concentrations have not been thoroughly investigated within the BRI areas. In this study, remote sensing raster data was combined with geographic grid units to examine variations in urbanization and PM2.5 within the BRI region, identifying “typical regions” where urbanization could enhance PM2.5 accumulation. The main results are as follows: i) The spatial autocorrelation of urbanization and PM2.5 concentrations has gradually strengthened, showing consistent high-value distributions in the North China Plain, Ganges Plain and indicating a synergistic growth among emerging developing regions such as China, India, and the Persian Gulf Coast. ii) The correlation between urbanization and PM2.5 concentrations exhibited a distinct trend of differentiation within the BRI regions. The influence of urbanization on PM2.5 changed from agglomeration to dispersion, forming a “typical region” category composed of ten countries, including China, India, and Morocco. iii) The three main urbanization-related factors for PM2.5 accumulation in the “typical regions” for 2005–2016 were energy pollution emission, economic activities, and human activities. By 2023, the effects of energy pollution and economic activities are expected to converge in some “typical region” countries. Targeted urban strategies and governance actions based on the different driving-types of “typical regions” in BRI have been proposed to coordinate relationship between urban construction and atmospheric environmental protection.

Abstract China has developed a remarkable economic growth in the past 30 years by accompanying with undesirable outputs. The assumptions of weak and strong of undesirable outputs have become the focus discussion in data envelopment analysis (DEA) models. To have a comprehensive environmental efficiency measurement, this paper proposes three DEA models considering weak disposability, strong disposability and distinguishing weak and strong disposability of undesirable outputs, respectively. We further combine with the Malmquist-Luenberger productivity index to assess the environmental efficiency and the dynamic change trend of 30 provinces in China from 2005 to 2014. The results show that distinguishing technical features of undesirable outputs makes a significant difference to final environmental efficiency score at different regions. The environmental efficiency of the whole nation, however, does not show any increasing trend during the ten years. Enhancing environmental efficiency of central and west area is an urgent task for Chinese government. The change trend of Malmquist-Luenberger productivity index and technological change shows a similar shape. Technical progress is the main driving force to enhance the environmental efficiency. Relevant suggestions are presented for improving the regional environmental efficiency in China in the future.