Analyzing Technology-Emissions Association in Top-10 Polluted MENA Countries: How to Ascertain Sustainable Development by Quantile Modeling Approach

Sinha, Avik and Shah, Muhammad Ibrahim and Sengupta, Tuhin and Jiao, Zhilun (2020): Analyzing Technology-Emissions Association in Top-10 Polluted MENA Countries: How to Ascertain Sustainable Development by Quantile Modeling Approach. Published in: Journal of Environmental Management , Vol. 267, (8 May 2020): p. 110602.

Abstract

This study investigates the relationship between technological progression and ambient air pollution in top-10 polluted Middle East and North African (MENA) countries by using monthly data for the period of 1990-2017. The Quantile cointegration proposed by Xiao (2009), Quantile-on-Quantile regression (QQ) proposed by Sim and Zhou (2015), and Quantile Autoregressive Granger causality developed by Troster (2018) are applied. In particular, we examine to which extent, quantiles of technological progression affect the quantiles of ambient air pollution, by developing separate indicators for both the mentioned aspects using Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Our empirical findings unfold mutual dependence between technological progression and ambient air pollution. Furthermore, the results of Quantile Autoregressive Granger causality test conclude a bidirectional causal relationship between technological progression and ambient air pollution.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Technological progression; Air pollution; Quantile modeling; MENA countries
• Subjects: Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics ; Environmental and Ecological Economics > Q5 - Environmental Economics; Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics ; Environmental and Ecological Economics > Q5 - Environmental Economics > Q53 - Air Pollution ; Water Pollution ; Noise ; Hazardous Waste ; Solid Waste ; Recycling

References

Abdouli, M., Hammami, S., 2017. Investigating the causality links between environmental quality, foreign direct investment and economic growth in MENA countries. Int. Bus. Rev. 26, 264–278.

Al-Marri, W., Al-Habaibeh, A., Watkins, M., 2018. An investigation into domestic energy consumption behaviour and public awareness of renewable energy in Qatar. Sustain. Cities Soc. 41, 639–646.

Alalouch, C., Al-Saadi, S., AlWaer, H., Al-Khaled, K., 2019. Energy saving potential for residential buildings in hot climates: the case of Oman. Sustain. Cities Soc. 46, 101442.

Albino, V., Ardito, L., Dangelico, R.M., Petruzzelli, A.M., 2014. Understanding the development trends of low-carbon energy technologies: a patent analysis. Appl. Energy 135, 836–854.

Alnaser, N.W., 2015. Building integrated renewable energy to achieve zero emission in Bahrain. Energy Build. 93, 32–39.

Alvarez-Herranz, A., Balsalobre-Lorente, D., Shahbaz, M., Cantos, J.M., 2017. Energy innovation and renewable energy consumption in the correction of air pollution levels. Energy Pol. 105, 386–397.

Alvi, S., Mahmood, Z., Nawaz, S.M.N., 2018. Dilemma of direct rebound effect and climate change on residential electricity consumption in Pakistan. Energy Rep. 4, 323–327.

Amato, A., Beolchini, F., 2018. End of life liquid crystal displays recycling: a patent review. J. Environ. Manag. 225, 1–9.

Babbie, E., 2005. The Basic of Social Research. Zhacomson Wadsworth, California.

Babiker, M.H., 2016. Options for climate change policy in MENA countries after Paris. Pol. Perspect. 18, 7–15.

Bekhet, H.A., Matar, A., Yasmin, T., 2017. CO2 emissions, energy consumption, economic growth, and financial development in GCC countries: dynamic simultaneous equation models. Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 70, 117–132.

Belgasim, B., Aldali, Y., Abdunnabi, M.J., Hashem, G., Hossin, K., 2018. The potential of concentrating solar power (CSP) for electricity generation in Libya. Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 90, 1–15.

Can, M., Gozgor, G., 2017. The impact of economic complexity on carbon emissions: evidence from France. Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. 24, 16364–16370.

Chang, B.H., Sharif, A., Aman, A., Suki, N.M., Salman, A., Khan, S.A.R., 2020. The asymmetric effects of oil price on sectoral Islamic stocks: new evidence from quantile-on-quantile regression approach. Resour. Pol. 65, 101571.

Cheng, C., Ren, X., Wang, Z., Yan, C., 2019. Heterogeneous impacts of renewable energy and environmental patents on CO2 emission-Evidence from the BRIICS. Sci. Total Environ. 668, 1328–1338.

Danish, Zhang, J., Hassan, S.T., Iqbal, K., 2020. Toward achieving environmental sustainability target in Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries: The role of real income, research and development, and transport infrastructure. Sustain. Dev. 28 (1), 83–90.

Dauda, L., Long, X., Mensah, C.N., Salman, M., 2019. The effects of economic growth and innovation on CO2 emissions in different regions. Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. 26, 15028–15038.

Dehwah, A.H., Asif, M., Rahman, M.T., 2018. Prospects of PV application in unregulated building rooftops in developing countries: a perspective from Saudi Arabia. Energy Build. 171, 76–87.

Demirel, P., Iatridis, K., Kesidou, E., 2018. The impact of regulatory complexity upon self-regulation: evidence from the adoption and certification of environmental management systems. J. Environ. Manag. 207, 80–91.

Destek, M.A., 2019. Investigation on the role of economic, social, and political globalization on environment: evidence from CEECs. Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. 1–14.

Dickey, D.A., Fuller, W.A., 1979. Distribution of the estimators for autoregressive time series with a unit root. J. Am. Stat. Assoc. 74, 427–431.

Dogan, B., Saboori, B., Can, M., 2019. Does economic complexity matter for environmental degradation? An empirical analysis for different stages of development. Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. 1–13.

Dost, M., Pahi, M.H., Magsi, H.B., Umrani, W.A., 2019. Influence of the best practices of environmental management on green product development. J. Environ. Manag. 241, 219–225.

Du, K., Li, P., Yan, Z., 2019. Do green technology innovations contribute to carbon dioxide emission reduction? Empirical evidence from patent data. Technol. Forecast. Soc. 146, 297–303.

Emirates Diplomatic Academy (EDA), 2019. SDG Index and Dashboards Report 2019: Arab Region. Sustainable Development Solutions Network.

Ganda, F., 2019. The impact of innovation and technology investments on carbon emissions in selected organisation for economic Co-operation and development countries. J. Clean. Prod. 217, 469–483.

Gelan, A.U., 2018. Kuwait’s energy subsidy reduction: examining economic and CO2 emission effects with or without compensation. Energy Econ. 71, 186–200.

Gillingham, K., Rapson, D., Wagner, G., 2016. The rebound effect and energy efficiency policy. Rev. Environ. Econ. Pol. 10, 68–88.

Gjoksi, N., 2011. Innovation and Sustainable Development: Linkages and Perspectives for Policies in Europe. European Sustainable Development Network.

G€oll, E., Uhl, A., Zwiers, J., 2019. Sustainable Development in the MENA Region. Middle East and North Africa Regional Architecture.

Gorus, M.S., Aydin, M., 2019. The relationship between energy consumption, economic growth, and CO2 emission in MENA countries: causality analysis in the frequency domain. Energy 168, 815–822.

Granger, C.W.J., 1969. Investigating causal relations by econometric models and crossspectral methods. Econometrica 37, 424–438.

Gu, W., Zhao, X., Yan, X., Wang, C., Li, Q., 2019. Energy technological progress, energy consumption, and CO2 emissions: empirical evidence from China. J. Clean. Prod. 236, 117666.

Hansen, B.E., 1999. Threshold effects in non-dynamic panels: estimation, testing, and inference. J. Econom. 93, 345–368.

Hascic, I., Silva, J., Johnstone, N., 2012. Climate Mitigation and Adaptation in Africa. In: OECD Environment Working Papers, No. 50. OECD.

Hashmi, R., Alam, K., 2019. Dynamic relationship among environmental regulation, innovation, CO2 emissions, population, and economic growth in OECD countries: a panel investigation. J. Clean. Prod. 231, 1100–1109.

Hosseini, S.M., Saifoddin, A., Shirmohammadi, R., Aslani, A., 2019. Forecasting of CO2 emissions in Iran based on time series and regression analysis. Energy Rep. 5, 619–631.

Inglesi-Lotz, R., 2018. Decomposing the South African CO2 emissions within a BRICS countries context: signalling potential energy rebound effects. Energy 147, 648–654.

Jin, L., Duan, K., Shi, C., Ju, X., 2017. The impact of technological progress in the energy sector on carbon emissions: an empirical analysis from China. Int. J. Environ. Res. Publ. Health 14, 1505.

Johansen, S., 1991. Estimation and hypothesis testing of cointegration vectors in Gaussian vector autoregressive models. Econometrica 59, 1551–1580.

Johansen, S., 1995. Likelihood-based Inference in Cointegrated Vector Autoregressive Models. Oxford University Press, Cambridge, MA.

Khazzoom, J.D., 1980. Economic implications of mandated efficiency in standards for household appliances. Energy J. 1, 21–40.

Kim, J., Sambudi, N.S., Cho, K., 2019. Removal of Sr2þ using high-surface-area hydroxyapatite synthesized by non-additive in-situ precipitation. J. Environ. Manag. 231, 788–794.

Koçak, E., Ulucak, Z.S¸., 2019. The effect of energy R&D expenditures on CO2 emission reduction: estimation of the STIRPAT model for OECD countries. Environ. Resour. Econ. 26, 14328–14338.

Koenker, R., 2004. Quantile regression for longitudinal data. J. Multivariate Anal. 91, 74–89.

Koenker, R., Machado, J.A., 1999. Goodness of fit and related inference processes for quantile regression. J. Am. Stat. Assoc. 94, 1296–1310.

Koenker, R., Xiao, Z., 2004. Unit root quantile autoregression inference. J. Am. Stat. Assoc. 99, 775–787.

Lee, K., Lee, S., 2013. Patterns of technological innovation and evolution in the energy sector: a patent-based approach. Energy Pol. 59, 415–432.

Lin, B., Zhu, J., 2019. The role of renewable energy technological innovation on climate change: empirical evidence from China. Sci. Total Environ. 659, 1505–1512.

Magazzino, C., 2015. Economic growth, CO2 emissions and energy use in Israel. Int. J. Sust. Dev. World 22, 89–97.

Meadows, D.L., 1974. Limits to Growth a Finite World. Cambrige University Press, Cambridge, MA.

Mensah, C.N., Long, X., Boamah, K.B., Bediako, I.A., Dauda, L., Salman, M., 2018. The effect of innovation on CO2 emissions of OCED countries from 1990 to 2014. Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. 25, 29678–29698.

Mensah, C.N., Long, X., Dauda, L., Boamah, K.B., Salman, M., 2019. Innovation and CO2 emissions: the complimentary role of eco-patent and trademark in the OECD economies. Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. 1–14.

Mikulcic, H., Wang, X., Duic, N., Dewil, R., 2020. Environmental problems arising from the sustainable development of energy, water and environment system. J. Environ. Manag. 259, 109666.

Moghadam, H.E., Dehbashi, V., 2018. The impact of financial development and trade on environmental quality in Iran. Empir. Econ. 54, 1777–1799.

Omar, N.S., 2019. Innovation and economic performance in MENA region. Rev. Econ. Pol. Sc. 4, 158–175.

Omri, A., 2013. CO2 emissions, energy consumption and economic growth nexus in MENA countries: evidence from simultaneous equations models. Energy Econ. 40, 657–664.

Pang, R., Zheng, D., Shi, M., Zhang, X., 2019. Pollute first, control later? Exploring the economic threshold of effective environmental regulation in China’s context. J. Environ. Manag. 248, 109275.

Phillips, P.C., Perron, P., 1988. Testing for a unit root in time series regression. Biometrika 75, 335–346.

Roy, V., Silvestre, B.S., Singh, S., 2020. Reactive and proactive pathways to sustainable apparel supply chains: manufacturer’s perspective on stakeholder salience and organizational learning toward responsible management. Int. J. Prod. Econ. 227, 107672.

Roy, V., Singh, S., 2017. Mapping the business focus in sustainable production and consumption literature: review and research framework. J. Clean. Prod. 150, 224–236.

Sabry, M.I., 2018. State business relations and innovation in the MENA region. Middle East Dev. J. 10, 195–224.

Said, Z., Alshehhi, A.A., Mehmood, A., 2018. Predictions of UAE’s renewable energy mix in 2030. Renew. Energy 118, 779–789.

Saidi, H., El Montasser, G., Ajmi, A.N., 2019. The role of institutions in the renewable energy-growth nexus in the MENA region: a panel cointegration approach. Environ. Model. Assess. 1–18.

Shahbaz, M., Nasir, M.A., Roubaud, D., 2018. Environmental degradation in France: the effects of FDI, financial development, and energy innovations. Energy Econ. 74, 843–857.

Shahbaz, M., Balsalobre-Lorente, D., Sinha, A., 2019. Foreign direct Investment–CO2 emissions nexus in Middle East and North African countries: importance of biomass energy consumption. J. Clean. Prod. 217, 603–614.

Shahbaz, M., Sinha, A., 2019. Environmental Kuznets curve for CO2 emissions: a literature survey. J. Econ. Stud. 46, 106–168.

Sharif, A., Baris-Tuzemen, O., Uzuner, G., Ozturk, I., Sinha, A., 2020a. Revisiting the role of renewable and non-renewable energy consumption on Turkey’s ecological footprint: evidence from Quantile ARDL approach. Sustain. Cities Soc. 57, 102138.

Sharif, A., Mishra, S., Sinha, A., Jiao, Z., Shahbaz, M., Afshan, S., 2020b. The renewable energy consumption-environmental degradation nexus in Top-10 polluted countries: fresh insights from quantile-on-quantile regression approach. Renew. Energy 150, 670–690.

Shuai, C., Shen, L., Jiao, L., Wu, Y., Tan, Y., 2017. Identifying key impact factors on carbon emission: evidences from panel and time-series data of 125 countries from 1990 to 2011. Appl. Energy 187, 310–325.

Sim, N., Zhou, H., 2015. Oil prices, US stock return, and the dependence between their quantiles. J. Bank. Finance 55, 1–8.

Sinha, A., Bhattacharya, J., 2016. Environmental Kuznets curve estimation for NO2 emission: a case of Indian cities. Ecol. Indicat. 67, 1–11.

Sinha, A., Bhattacharya, J., 2017. Estimation of environmental Kuznets curve for SO2 emission: a case of Indian cities. Ecol. Indicat. 72, 881–894.

Sinha, A., Gupta, M., Shahbaz, M., Sengupta, T., 2019. Impact of corruption in public sector on environmental quality: implications for sustainability in BRICS and next 11 countries. J. Clean. Prod. 232, 1379–1393.

Sinha, A., Sengupta, T., 2019. Impact of energy mix on nitrous oxide emissions: an environmental Kuznets curve approach for APEC countries. Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. 26, 2613–2622.

Sinha, A., Sengupta, T., Alvarado, R., 2020. Interplay between technological innovation and environmental quality: formulating the SDG policies for next 11 economies. J. Clean. Prod. 242, 118549.

Sinha, A., Shahbaz, M., Sengupta, T., 2018. Renewable energy policies and contradictions in causality: a case of Next 11 countries. J. Clean. Prod. 197, 73–84.

Song, M., Fisher, R., Kwoh, Y., 2019. Technological challenges of green innovation and sustainable resource management with large scale data. Technol. Forecast. Soc. 144, 361–368.

Tagliapietra, S., 2019. The impact of the global energy transition on MENA oil and gas producers. Energy Strateg. Rev. 26, 100397.

Troster, V., 2018. Testing for granger-causality in quantiles. Econ. Rev. 37, 850–866.

Troster, V., Shahbaz, M., Uddin, G.S., 2018. Renewable energy, oil prices, and economic activity: a Granger-causality in quantiles analysis. Energy Econ. 70, 440–452.

United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), 2019. Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals: a far-fetched dream for millions of girls, boys and youth in the Middle East and North Africa. Available at: https://www.unicef.org/mena/press-releases/achieving-sustainable-development-goals-far-fetched-dream-milli ons-girls-boys-and.

Wang, B., Sun, Y., Wang, Z., 2018. Agglomeration effect of CO2 emissions and emissions reduction effect of technology: a spatial econometric perspective based on China’s province-level data. J. Clean. Prod. 204, 96–106.

Wasti, S.K.A., Zaidi, S.W., 2020. An empirical investigation between CO2 emission, energy consumption, trade liberalization and economic growth: a case of Kuwait. J. Build. Eng. 28, 101104.

World Bank, 2018. World development indicator. Available at: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/.

Xiao, Z., 2009. Quantile cointegrating regression. J. Econom. 150, 248–260.

Yuan, B., Zhang, Y., 2020. Flexible environmental policy, technological innovation and sustainable development of China’s industry: the moderating effect of environment regulatory enforcement. J. Clean. Prod. 243, 118543.

Zafar, M.W., Shahbaz, M., Hou, F., Sinha, A., 2019. From nonrenewable to renewable energy and its impact on economic growth: the role of research & development expenditures in Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation countries. J. Clean. Prod. 212, 1166–1178.