All IPCC (2018) pathways to restrict future global warming to 1.5°C (and well below an already dangerous 2°C) involve radical cuts in global carbon emissions. Such de-carbonization, while being technically feasible, may impose a ‘limit' or ‘planetary boundary' to growth, depending on...

The standard approach to the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) holds that as a country develops and GDP per capita grows environmental degradation initially increases but eventually it reaches a turning point where environmental degradation begins to decline. Environmental degradation takes many...

Korea’s greenhouse gas emissions almost doubled between 1990 and 2005, the highest growth rate in the OECD area. Korea recently set a target of reducing emissions by 30% by 2020 relative to a “business as usual” baseline, implying a 4% cut from the 2005 level. Achieving this objective in a...

This paper assesses the low-carbon economy in Asia: how large it is today and how well it will fare in the future. Using patent and trade data, it analyzes the potential of Asian economies to capture value from the design and export of low-carbon technologies, acknowledging that these are only...

Environmental degradation and the risks from climate change have strengthened the need for cleaner forms of economic growth. Using patent, trade and output data, we measure the current size of Asia’s low-carbon economy and assess its competitiveness across key sectors. We look at three success...

The purpose of this article is twofold: First to discuss three misconceptions in the debate on climate policies: i) that de-growth is necessary, ii) that the market economy is part of the problem rather than part of the solution to climate change, and iii) that the only policy tool needed is to...

The rapid rise in greenhouse gas emissions have become a global concern catching the attention of policy makers and researchers all over the world. Fossil fuel combustion has been named as the major source of greenhouse gas emissions, meanwhile, studies focusing on fossil fuel impact on CO2...

Eradicating extreme poverty from the face of the earth once and for all is a central goal of the post-2015 development agenda. Without a rapid transition of the world economy to a low-carbon growth path over the next few decades, this ambitious goal will remain elusive. Under current greenhouse...

This paper examines convergence of per capita carbon dioxide (CO2) emission for a panel of 124 countries taking into account the impact of the quality of government institutions. The analysis builds on both parametric and nonparametric panel data techniques, and we examine the β-convergence...