The nexus between road transport intensity and road-related CO₂ emissions in G20 countries: an advanced panel estimation

This study determines the dynamic linkages between road transport intensity, road transport passenger and road transport freight, and road carbon emissions in G20 countries in the presence of economic growth, urbanization, crude oil price, and trade openness for the period of 1990 to 2016, under the multivariate framework. This study employs the residual-based Kao and Westerlund cointegration technique to find long-run cointegration, and continuously updated bias-corrected (CUP-BC) and continuously updated fully modified (CUP-FM) methods to check the long-run elasticities between the variables. The long-run estimators’ findings suggest a positive and significant impact of road transport intensity, road passenger transport, road freight transport on road transport CO₂ emissions. Economic growth and urbanization are significant contributing factors in road transport CO₂ emissions, while trade openness and crude oil price significantly reduce road transport CO₂ emissions. The Dumitrescu and Hurlin causality test results disclose unidirectional causality from road transport intensity and road transport freight to the road transport CO₂ emissions. However, the causality between road passenger transport and road transport CO₂ emissions is bidirectional. Finally, comprehensive policy options like subsidizing environmental-friendly technologies, developing green transport infrastructure, and enacting decarbonizing regulations are suggested to address the G20 countries’ environmental challenges.