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Exploring the existence of aviation Kuznets curve in the context of environmental pollution for OECD nations

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Abstract

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.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Economics Department, Hazara University, Mansehra, KPK, Pakistan

    Syeda Anam Hassan, Misbah Nosheen & Inayatul Haq

  2. COMSATS University Islamabad, Abbottabad Campus, KPK, Pakistan

    Nazish Rafaz

Authors
  1. Syeda Anam Hassan
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  2. Misbah Nosheen
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  3. Nazish Rafaz
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  4. Inayatul Haq
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Contributions

Dr. Syeda Anam Hassan and Inayatul Haq were involved in data source and methodology, estimations and results discussion, conclusion and manuscript writing (Section: 3, 4 and 5). Nazish Rafaz and Dr. Misbah Nosheen contributed to introduction, literature review, recommendations, references correction, and manuscript editing (Section: 1 and 2).

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Correspondence to Syeda Anam Hassan.

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Appendices

Appendix 1

  1. 1.

    Australia

  2. 2.

    Austria

  3. 3.

    Canada

  4. 4.

    Chile

  5. 5.

    Finland

  6. 6.

    France

  7. 7.

    Germany

  8. 8.

    Ice land

  9. 9.

    Israel

  10. 10.

    Italy

  11. 11.

    Japan

  12. 12.

    Mexico

  13. 13.

    Netherlands

  14. 14.

    New Zealand

  15. 15.

    Portugal

  16. 16.

    South Korea

  17. 17.

    Spain

  18. 18.

    Switzerland

  19. 19.

    Turkey

  20. 20.

    United Kingdom

  21. 21.

    United States

Appendix 2

See Table 9.

Table 9 Pairwise dumitrescu hurlin panel causality tests
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Hassan, S.A., Nosheen, M., Rafaz, N. et al. Exploring the existence of aviation Kuznets curve in the context of environmental pollution for OECD nations. Environ Dev Sustain 23, 15266–15289 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-021-01297-0

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