Short and Long-Run Causal Effects of CO 2 Emissions, Energy Use, GDP and Population Growth: Evidence from India Using the ARDL and VECM Approaches.

This paper investigates the nexus between CO₂ emissions (CO₂E), GDP, energy use (ENU), and population growth (PG) in India from 1980–2018 by comparing the "vector error correction" model (VECM) and "auto regressive distributed lag" (ARDL). We applied the unit root test, Johansen multi-variate cointegration, and performed a Variance decomposition analysis using the Cholesky approach. The VECM and ARDL-bound testing approaches to cointegration suggest a long-term equilibrium nexus between GDP, energy use, population growth and CO₂E. The empirical outcomes show the existence of a long-term equilibrium nexus between the variables. The Granger causality results show that short-term bi-directional causality exists between GDP and ENU, while a uni-directional causality between CO₂E and GDP, CO₂E and ENU, CO₂E and PG, and PG and ENU. Evidence from variance decomposition indicates that 58.4% of the future fluctuations in CO₂E are due to changes in ENU, 2.8% of the future fluctuations are due to changes in GDP, and 0.43% of the future fluctuations are due to changes in PG. Finally, the ARDL test results indicate that a 1% increase in PG will lead to a 1.4% increase in CO₂E. Our paper addresses some important policy implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]