Determinants of the global and regional CO2 emissions: What causes what and where?

Using the Stochastic Impacts by Regression on Population, Affluence, and Technology (STIRPAT) model and an unbalanced panel dataset of 128 countries covering 1990-2014, this study aims to examine the key impact factors (KIFs) of the global and regional carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and analyse the effectiveness of non-renewable and renewable energies. Given the potential cross-sectional dependence and slope heterogeneity, a series of econometric techniques allowing for cross-sectional dependence and slope heterogeneity is applied. The overall estimations imply that the KIFs at the global level are economic growth, followed by population size, non-renewable energy, and energy intensity in order of their impacts on CO2 emissions; conversely, the KIFs at the regional level vary across different regions and estimators. The results also suggest that renewable energy can lead to a decline in CO2 emissions at the global level. At the regional level, only for two regions (i.e., S. & Cent. America and Europe & Eurasia) renewable energy has a significant and negative effect on CO2 emissions, which may be affected by the share of renewable energy consumption in the primary energy mix. Finally, the results indicate varied causality relationships among the variables across regions.