Environmental degradation has put significant consequences at both the national and global levels. Economic development and ecological sustainability can be achieved by an increase in economic growth but on the cost of environmental quality. The basic aim of this analysis is to find the existence of the aviation Kuznets curve (AKC) and the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) for the selected 21 OECD nations from 1980 to 2018. The aviation cargo and aviation passengers’ patterns are separately analyzed in relation to CO2 emissions to quantify whether Kuznets phenomenon exists in the aviation industry of OECD nations? The econometric results of panel GMM confirm the validation of the aviation Kuznets curve in case of aviation passengers such that the “inverted U shaped” pattern. While the environmental Kuznets curve and aviation cargo Kuznets curve do not exist in the OECD nation. It means that an increase in aviation cargo and economic growth increases the CO2 emissions showing the “U shaped” association. Moreover, the Pairwise Dumitrescu Hurlin panel causality test exhibits uni–directional association moving from economic growth to carbon emissions, while there is bidirectional granger causality among trade openness, aviation sector, and energy consumption to carbon emissions. The overall results suggest that OECD nations must consider the pollution reduction techniques, investment in renewable sources, continuous research, implementation of efficient energy sources, and the imposition of aviation emissions taxes to limit the pollution.