No abstract

No abstract

Since global warming has become a serious threat and GHG emissions are one of the main causes of it, analyzing the interactions between variables related to climate change has gained importance. This study investigates the nexus of per capita CO2 emissions, per capita real GDP or income, per capita natural gas consumption, urban population, and trade openness by examining the validity of the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis for a panel of selected gas-producing countries over the period 1990–2020. To these data, slope homogeneity test, Granger causality in panels, stationarity tests, and cointegration tests are applied. A particular focus is on procedures that enable cross-sectional dependence. Admitting slope heterogeneity, the estimators provide mixed results. The findings, however, do provide evidence in favor of the EKC hypothesis in at least some of our sample countries. Furthermore, there are important policy implications that must be taken into consideration. This includes investing in clean technologies to reduce emissions and accelerating reform of fossil fuel subsidies.

Oil prices are crucial for a wide area of economic decisions ranging from households over business to economic policymaking. Therefore, oil price projections are a crucial input to economic models and to economic activity forecasts. This paper assesses the accuracy and efficiency of crude oil price forecasts published by different organisations, think tanks and companies. Since the sequence of published forecasts appears as smooth, the weak efficiency criterion is clearly violated. Even combining forecasts, cannot increase efficiency due to high correlation among various forecasts. This pattern of oil price forecasts can be attributed to combining myopia (use current oil price levels as a basis) with Hotelling‐type exponential growth. Another behavioural explanation in source of inefficiencies is that forecasters prefer to harmonise their forecasts with other forecasters in order to be not an outlier.

The mid-century milestone of 2050, almost as if it were a red letter year, has a target on its back as the year in which the world is expected to achieve – or at least strive for in the present – net-zero CO₂ emissions.