The dynamic intensity of CO2 emissions: empirical evidence for the 20th century

The debate around the economic growth and environmental degradation is the hot topic among academics. However, up to a point, all of them embrace the uncontroversial view that tells us that anthropic factors have leverage on global climate. It happens that the so-called greenhouse effect is closely related to the accumulation of certain gases in the atmosphere, e.g, carbon dioxide, whose original source comes from productive sectors. Thus, our purpose in this article is to estimate the rate of emission intensity – here we mean the ratio between CO2 emissions and GDP – which has increased since the early part of the 20th century. To support that idea, this study reports on data from 24 different countries. In terms of C02 emission, the results undoubtedly show that United Kingdom and the United States highlight a negative picture, particularly when both are compared to India. It should be noted the presence of structural changes, which coincide with three major historical events: the World War I (1914-1918), the Great Depression in the 1930s, and finally the Oil-price shocks in the 1970s. As the result of the analysis demonstrates, the amount of emission produced by developing countries is surprisingly low. That the technology reveals its relative merit for reducing the overall emission intensity is transparently obvious. JEL Classification: K32.