No abstract

The main objective of this study is to explore the dynamic relationship between the level of democracy and the amount of fossil fuel in the energy consumption mix in Nigeria over the period 1975–2020. To achieve this objective, the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing method is applied. The results revealed that democracy has a positive and significant long (lasting) and short run (immediate) effects on the amount of fossil fuel in the energy consumption mix in Nigeria. However, the positive effect decreases significantly with an increase in the level of oil dependence in the short run. The results of this study in general support the view that high dependence of political democratic institution on oil wealth reduces the positive effects of democracy in making public goods available in oil-exporting economies. This study therefore recommend that diversification away from fossil fuel in energy consumption mix in Nigeria which may require formulating appropriate policies that will increase access to cleaner forms of energy (e.g. solar and wind energy) in the economy.

The need for adequate and consistent policies to mitigate the continuous rise of carbon emission have motivated the energy economist in the past decades to actively involved and explore common economic agents that are driving the rising pattern in the environmental pollution. This study is positioned towards contributing to the on-going debates on this issue by exploring the impact of bank credit to the private sector on aggregate carbon emissions and carbon emission intensity in Nigeria over the period 1971– 2016 using dynamic ARDL simulations. Controlling for the influence of fossil energy intensity of consumption and economic globalization, the study found that bank credit to the private sector has a positive significant long-run increasing effect on aggregate CO2 emission and carbon emission intensity in the economy. Second, the estimated coefficients show that fossil energy intensity of consumption and economic globalization have a significant long-run and short-run increasing impact on aggregate CO2 emission and carbon emission intensity in the economy. In contrast, the population has a significant long-run and short-run reducing effect on aggregate CO2 emission and only the long run reducing effect on carbon emission intensity. Third, economic growth has significant short-run and increasing long-run effects on aggregate CO2 emission and a long run increasing effect on carbon emission intensity. In sum, the results show that the economy is yet to transient to renewable energy.