Does energy consumption contribute to climate change? Evidence from major regions of the world

This study is a contribution to the on-going debate over whether there is a relationship between energy consumption and climatic change variables, although the developed regions are among the most energy intensive economies in the world, little attention has been paid to the features of their energy consumption and climatic variations. Therefore, this study empirically investigates the two variables dynamic relationship in five broader regions of the world i.e., South Asia, Middle East and North Africa (MENA region), Sub-Saharan Africa, East Asia and Pacific and the aggregate data of the World. The major climatic variables include atmospheric, topographic, living organisms threatened; water system and growth factors are used to investigate energy-climate nexus over a period of 1975-2011. The results of the study indicate that there exists a long-run equilibrium relationship between energy consumption and climatic variables which shows climatic variations due to changes in energy consumption in different regions of the world. Although, the causality results are mixed among regions, we do find a systematic pattern. The present study find evident of unidirectional causality between the electric power consumption and climatic factors in the World's selected region. Sound and effective energy consumption strategy may reduce the burden of global warming situation in the world. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.