nvestigation of Cointegration Relationship Between Per Capita GDP and Per Capita CO2 Emission and Existence of Environmental Kuznets Curve for CO2 in Iran

Document Type : Original Articles

Authors

1 Department of Agricultural Economics, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Orumieh

2 Ph.D. Students of Agricultural Economics, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Tehran

Abstract

More than half of the Greenhouse Effect is from carbon dioxide emissions. Emissions of carbon dioxide cause undesirable climatic and environmental effects and, finally, affect the global economy. Because of the importance of determining the economic impacts of increasing CO2 emissions, this study investigates the cointegration relationship between per capita Gross Domestic Production (GDP) and per capita CO2 emissions during 1974-2004 and also tests the existence of an Environmental Kuznets Curve for Carbon Dioxide during this period. The Auto Regressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) method and Error Correction Model (ECM) were used to study the cointegration relationship. Results indicated that in both short- and long-term period, a significant relationship exists between variables. On the other hand, the coefficient of error correction term was -0.19 and statistically significant. According to the results of the differential models between per capita GDP and per capita CO2 emission, Environmental Kuznets Curve for CO2 exists during this period. Keywords: Cointegration, ARDL, ECM, Environmental CO2, Kuznets Curve, Iran.

Keywords