Asymmetric nexus of coal consumption with environmental quality and economic growth: Evidence from BRICS, E7, and Fragile Five countries by novel quantile approaches

The study analyzes the asymmetric nexus of coal consumption with environmental quality and economic growth. In this context, the study focuses on eight leading emerging countries that take place in BRICS, E7, and Fragile Five groups. Also, the study uses yearly data from 1989 to 2021 and performs novel quantile methods, such as Granger Causality-in-Quantiles and Quantile-on-Quantile Regression (QQR). Also, quantile regression is used for robustness check. The results present that (i) there are causalities from coal consumption to both environmental quality and economic growth at 10% significance, whereas quantile and country-based results differ; (ii) effects of coal consumption on environmental quality are much stronger in lower quantiles for Brazil, Indonesia, India, South Africa, and, Turkey, but in higher quantiles for China, Mexico, and Russia; (iii) effects of coal consumption on economic growth are much stronger in lower quantiles for Brazil, Indonesia, India, Russia, South Africa, and Turkey; in higher quantiles for China; lower and middle quantiles for Russia; and all quantiles for Mexico; and (iv) the robustness of the QQR results are validated. Hence, empirical outcomes underline the highly crucial effects of coal consumption on environmental quality and economic growth in the countries. The results imply that policymakers should focus on efforts to decrease coal consumption gradually by applying a macro transition plan to increase environmental quality without causing economic decline by considering changing effects of coal consumption at quantiles and countries.