.


International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy | Vol 7 • Issue 5 • 201734

International Journal of Energy Economics and 
Policy

ISSN: 2146-4553

available at http: www.econjournals.com

International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, 2017, 7(5), 34-43.

Environment–economic Growth Nexus: A Comparative Analysis 
of Developed and Developing Countries#1

Ali Acaravci1*, Guray Akalin2

1Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, Mustafa Kemal University, Hatay, Turkey, 2Faculty of Economics and 
Administrative Sciences, Dumlupınar University, Kutahya, Turkey. *Email: acaravci@hotmail.com

ABSTRACT

This study aims to examine the interaction between carbon emissions, income, and trade openness in developed and developing countries for the 
period from 1980 to 2010 by using recently developed panel data econometric methods. The results are as follows: (i) There is an evidence of the 
cross-sectional dependence for each variable. (ii) The cross-sectionally augmented and Smith et al.’s panel unit root tests are indicate that all variables 
are stationary at their first difference. (iii) A Durbin–Hausman cointegration test shows that there exists a long-term relationship between variables. 
(iv) The results from the common correlated effect estimator presents that there is evidence of the validity of the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) 
hypothesis in developed countries. (v) The EKC hypothesis is not valid in developing countries.

Keywords: Economic Growth, Environmental Kuznets Curve, Panel Data Analysis 
JEL Classification: C33, O57, Q43, Q53, Q56

# This paper depends on the results of Guray AKALIN’s Master Thesis: “Enviromental kuznets curve validity of the developed and developing countries-comparative 
analysis of panel data.”

1. INTRODUCTION

The primary goal of economic activities is to increase human 
welfare and rapid economic growth is seen as a way to accomplish 
this goal. However, when production increases the use of resources 
while the relative cost of production factors diminish, wastes 
generated by the production and consumption process raise the 
environmental cost. Moreover, population growth, urbanization, 
and the increasing of use of non-renewable energy can overtake 
the carrying capacity of the environment. As a result, many 
environmental problems have begun to emerge that includes 
climate change; global warming; air, water, and soil pollution; loss 
of biodiversity; and forest destruction. As environmental problems 
have become more severe, the nexus between environmental 
degradation and economic growth becomes an increasingly 
important issue (Tutulmaz, 2015).

The environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis, which 
implies an inverted-U relationship between environmental 
degradation and economic growth, has become the center of this 

research. According to the EKC hypothesis, economic growth 
is both cause of and solution to environmental degradation. For 
this reason, testing the EKC hypothesis becomes prominent 
to economic growth and environmental policies. The EKC 
hypothesis that inspired from the Kuznets curve, has been 
first proposed and tested by Grossman and Krueger (1991). 
They found evidence that the environmental degradation first 
increases as per capita income rise, but then starts to decrease 
after turning point in per capita income. Their study has been 
also confirmed by Shafik and Bandyopadhyay (1992) and 
Panayotou (1993). Stern (2004), Dinda (2004), Shahbaz et al. 
(2015), Ozturk and Al-mulali (2015), Tang et al. (2016) and 
Gill et al. (2017) have provided extensive review surveys of 
the studies that tested the nexus between economic growth and 
environmental pollution. While Johansson and Kriström (2008) 
have emphasized that the literature on the EKC is insufficient 
and this topic needs more empirical investigation. Stern (2004) 
argued that the issues of the EKC should be revisited by using 
new models and decompositions with different panels and time 
series data sets.



Acaravci and Akalin: Environment–economic Growth Nexus: A Comparative Analysis of Developed and Developing Countries

International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy | Vol 7 • Issue 5 • 2017 35

However, few scholars as Panayotou (1993) believe that the EKC 
is caused by upgrading from the adjustment of economic structures 
(Tiwari et al., 2013). Some of these authors have underlined the 
roles of three different effects in the EKC (Tutulmaz, 2015), that 
can be listed as scale effects, structural effects and technique 
effects (Grossman and Krueger, 1991; Stern, 2004; Song et al., 
2008): (i) Scale effect means that using more natural resources 
in the production process leads to the destruction of nature 
while technology is constant, which is defined as environmental 
degradation. (ii) According to the structural effect, economic 
development passes through stages starting from the preliminary 
upgrade from an agriculture system to the rapid development of 
high-grade, industrial structures with high-pollution industries and 
then finally turns to more information-concentrated industries, 
which leads to improvements in environmental quality. (iii) In 
the technique effect that discovered by Stokey (1998), economic 
growth can break through one threshold point after arriving at a 
certain stage of economic development. Hence, at a low-income 
level, only the high pollution technique can be used but, after 
crossing the threshold point of economic development, cleaner 
technologies can be adopted which lowers the degradation in 
environmental quality.

Further, another approach to explain the EKC relationship is 
the income elasticity of demand for environmental quality. The 
demand for a clean environment increases while real income per 
capita increases (Lopez and Islam, 2008). Lieb (2002) argued 
that an increase in income improves the level of education, 
and this creates awareness about the environment. Moreover, 
an increase in income distribution has positive effects on the 
environment. Finally, he mentions that the policies implemented 
after the internalization of external effects, substitution between 
the pollutants, and finally a crisis in the energy sector will affect 
the shape of the EKC and its turning point.

In this context, this study aims to test the EKC hypothesis in 
developed and developing countries for the period from 1980 
to 2010 by using panel data econometric methods. To test the 
EKC hypothesis, the common correlated effect (CCE) estimator, 
developed by Pesaran (2006), has been employed in a multivariate 
framework which includes carbon emissions, gross domestic 
product (GDP) per capita, and trade openness rate (% of GDP). 
The rest of the paper is organized as follows: Section 2 summarizes 
literature on the EKC hypothesis; Section 3 describes the model 
and the data; Section 4 explains the methodology and Section 5 
reports the empirical results; and finally, Section 6 concludes the 
paper.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

Many empirical studies attempt to test the validity of the EKC 
by using a quadratic or cubic equation. This equation examines 
the relationship between the per capita incomes with a variety of 
air pollution indices. A basic reduced (income-reduced) form of 
an EKC model and interpretation is summarized as by De Bruyn 
and Heintz (1999):

E Y Y Y Zit it it it it it= + + + + +β β β β β ε1 2 3
2

4

3

5
 (1)

Where E represents environmental pressure or environmental 
pollution; Y represents economic development; Z is other variables; 
i and t are country and time indices; and ε is the error term. 
Equation (1) lets us test several forms of environment–economic 
development/growth relationships that can be described as follows:
i) If β2=β3=β4=0, there is a flat pattern (no relationship) between 

Y and E.
ii) If β2>0 and β3=β4=0, there is a monotonic increasing 

relationship (a linear relationship) between Y and E.
iii) If β2<0 and β3=β4=0, there is a monotonic decreasing 

relationship between Y and E.
iv) If β2>0, β3<0 and β4=0, there is an inverted-U-shaped 

relationship.
v) If β2<0, β3>0 and β4<0, there is an inverted N-shaped 

relationship.
vi) If β2>0, β3<0 and β4>0, there is a cubic polynomial or N-shaped 

relationship.

A large number of econometric studies have used equation (1) to 
test for the emergence of an EKC in a wide variety of income-
based environmental pressure/pollution levels (Dinda, 2004). The 
studies that investigate the relationship between the environment 
and economic growth have begun in 1990 as a reaction to 
environmental issues. Most of this works have tested the EKC 
hypothesis. In these studies, different models, methods, data 
sets, and variables have been used. Most studies in this area have 
been examined by us and are shown in the following Table 1. The 
results of the literature review indicate that there is no consensus 
on this issue.

3. MODEL AND DATA

This paper employs the form of a cubic model in order to test EKC 
hypothesis that can be introduced as follows:

co gdp gdp gdp trit i it it it it it2 1 2 3
2

4

3

5
= + + + + +β β β β β ε  (2)

Where co2, carbon emissions per capita (measured in metric 
kilograms), is the environmental indicator that is directly related 
to major issues such as climate change; gdp is the per capita 
income (constant 2005 USD), and to improve the structure of an 
econometric model, trade openness rate (% of GDP), tr, is used as 
a control variable. The annual time series data is taken from the 
World Bank, World Development Indicators (2014) online for the 
period from 1980 to 2010 in the form of balanced panel data. The 
following two samples are used: 40 high-income countries and 
33 upper middle-income countries. The 40 high-income countries 
include Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, Austria, Bahamas, 
Bahrain, Barbados, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Cyprus, Denmark, 
Equatorial Guinea, Finland, France, Greece, Hong Kong SAR 
(China), Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, 
Macao, Malta, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Oman, 
Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Spain, Saint Kitts, Sweden, 
Switzerland, Trinidad, the United Kingdom, the United States, 
and Uruguay. The 33 upper middle-income countries include 
Albania, Algeria, Argentina, Belize, Botswana, Brazil, Bulgaria, 
China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominica, Dominican 
Republic, Ecuador, Fiji, Gabon, Grenada, Hungary, Jordan, 



Acaravci and Akalin: Environment–economic Growth Nexus: A Comparative Analysis of Developed and Developing Countries

International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy | Vol 7 • Issue 5 • 201736

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Acaravci and Akalin: Environment–economic Growth Nexus: A Comparative Analysis of Developed and Developing Countries

International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy | Vol 7 • Issue 5 • 2017 37

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Acaravci and Akalin: Environment–economic Growth Nexus: A Comparative Analysis of Developed and Developing Countries

International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy | Vol 7 • Issue 5 • 201738

Malaysia, Mauritania, Mexico, Panama, Peru, Seychelles Islands, 
South Africa, Santa Lucia, Saint Vincent, Thailand, Tonga, Tunis, 
Turkey, and Venezuela. These countries were selected according 
to data available from related income groups.

4. METHODOLOGY

4.1. Testing the Cross-sectional Dependency
Conventional panel unit root tests which are also known as first-
generation like those of Hadri (2000), Levin–Lin–Chu (LLC, 
2002), and Im–Pesaran–Shin (IPS, 2003) assume that cross 
sections are independent and are not able to consider the cross 
section dependency. This is particularly true of panels with a 
large cross section dimension (N). In the case of panels where 
N is small (say 10 or less) and the time dimension of the panel 
(T) is sufficiently large between sections of panel models, it can 
cause serious correlations (Pesaran, 2004). The cross-sectional 
dependency in error terms can be caused by several reasons. The 
first of these neglects spatial and common effect, while the other 
neglects the relationship between socio-economic networks in the 
panel model. It does not consider the cross-sectional dependence 
that occurs due to these reasons and the estimates made by the 
traditional panel estimator can produce misleading or even 
inconsistent parameters (Chudik and Pesaran, 2013). Therefore, 
the cross-dependency should be tested on the basis of both models 
and variables. If cross-sectional dependence exists in the variables 
or model, using the first-generation tests may cause the first type 
of error. For a more reliable econometric estimation approach, 
researchers must explore cross-sectional dependency in each 
series and model.

Breusch and Pagan (1980) proposed the following Lagrange 
multiplier test statistic to test for cross-sectional dependency:

CD T pLM ij
j i

N

i

N

1

2

11

1

=
= +=

−

∑∑   (3)
where pij is the estimated correlation coefficient among the 

residuals obtained from individual ordinary least squares (OLS) 
estimations. Under the null hypothesis of no cross-sectional 
dependency with a fixed N (number of cross-sections) and time 
period T→∞, the statistic has chi-square asymptotic distribution 
with N(N-1)/2 degrees of freedom. However, this test is not 
applicable with a large N. To overcome this problem, the Lagrange 
multiplier statistic developed by Pesaran (2004) can be used as 
shown in the following equation:

CD
N N

TpLM ij
j i

N

i

N

2

1 2

2

11

1
1

1
1=

−








 −( )

= +=

−

∑∑
( )

/

  (4)

Under the null hypothesis of no cross-sectional dependency with 
first T→∞ and then N→∞, this test statistic is an asymptotic 
standard normal distribution. Even though the CDLM2 test 
overcomes the drawback of CDLM1, it likely exhibits substantial 
size distortions when N/T→∞. When N is large and T is small, 
Pesaran (2004) proposed to use of the following cross-sectional 
dependency test:

CD
T

N N
pLM ij

j i

N

i

N

3

1 2

11

1
2

1
=

−










= +=

−

∑∑
( )

/

  (5)

Under the null hypothesis of no cross-sectional dependency with 
T→∞ and N→∞ in any order, the CDLM3 test is asymptotically 
distributed as standard normal (Nazlıoglu et al., 2011).

4.2. Panel Unit Root Tests
This paper employs two panel unit root tests developed by Pesaran 
(2007) (cross-sectionally augmented Dickey–Fuller [CADF]) 
and Smith et al. (2004) (hereafter Smith bootstrap) in order to 
investigate the stationarity properties and determine the order of 
integration of the variables.

The most important feature of the CADF panel unit root test is 
to give reliable results whether N>T or T>N. Furthermore, this 
test is a heterogeneous test and provides separate results for each 
section (Pesaran, 2007).

The Smith bootstrap panel unit root approach includes five test 
statistics which are called as t*, LM , Max , Min , and WS . The 
t* test is the bootstrap version of the IPS panel unit test and is 

calculated as t N ti
i

N
* = −

=
∑1
1

. The LM test has been developed by 

Solo (1984) and tests statistic is calculated as LM N LMi
i

N

= −
=
∑1

1
. 

The Max  test has been developed by Leybourne (1995) and is 

calculated as Max N Maxi
i

N

= −
=
∑1

1
. The Min  test is a more 

powerful variant of the LM statistic and is calculated as 

Min N Mini
i

N

= −
=
∑1

1
. Finally, we examine the WS  test developed 

by Pantula et al. (1994). The first test does not consider the 
cross-sectional dependence. We use bootstrap blocks of m=102. 
All four tests are constructed with a unit root under the null 
hypothesis and heterogeneous autoregressive roots under the 
alternative, which indicates that a rejection should be taken as 
evidence in favor of stationarity for at least one country (Smith 
et al. 2004).

4.3. Panel Cointegration and Estimating of the 
Long-run Coefficients
This paper employs Durbin-Hausman cointegration test in order 
to investigate the existence of long-run relationship between 
variables. Durbin-Hausman test allows the cross-sectional 
dependency in model and gives reliable results when some of 
explanatory variables are I(0). This test contains two statistics as 
follows: The DH-group and the DH-panel statistics. While the 
DH-group statistic assumes that the autoregressive parameters 
are heterogeneous and produces results under this assumption; 
the DH-panel statistic assumes that the autoregressive parameters 
are homogeneous and produces results under this assumption. In 
a case when both test statistics reject the null hypothesis; these 
results indicate the existence of co-integration for the entire panel 
(Westerlund, 2008).

Once the cointegration relationship is established, the next 
step is to estimate the long-run parameters. To estimate panel 
cointegration parameters, various methods have been proposed, 



Acaravci and Akalin: Environment–economic Growth Nexus: A Comparative Analysis of Developed and Developing Countries

International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy | Vol 7 • Issue 5 • 2017 39

namely panel OLS, panel dynamic OLS, and panel fully 
modified OLS. However, none of these consider cross-sectional 
dependence. To consider the cross-sectional dependence, we use 
the CCE estimator developed by Pesaran (2006). Moreover, the 
CCE estimator has satisfactory small sample properties even 
under a substantial degree of heterogeneity and dynamics or 
relatively small values of N and T (Pesaran, 2006). This model’s 
estimators consider the effects of factors that are not included in 
the econometric model coupled with a cross section of each unit’s 
time vector regression equations.

The CCE estimator assumes that the effects of unobserved 
common effects and independent variables are stationary and 
external, but this approach continues to yield consistent estimation 
and valid inference even when common factors are unit root 
processes (Pesaran, 2006). The CCE also allows for individual 
specific errors to be serially correlated and heteroscedastic. In the 
model, the common correlated effects pooled statistics are used 
for the panel and are calculated as follows:



b X M X X M yp i i w i
i

N

i i w i
i

N

= ′








 ′

=

−

=
∑ ∑θ θ

1

1

1
 (6)

5. EMPIRICAL RESULTS

5.1. Cross-sectional Dependence Tests Results
Table 2 presents that the null hypothesis of no cross-sectional 
dependency is rejected for both countries. This provides strong 
evidence for the existence of cross-sectional dependency across 
developed and developing countries. This means that, whether 

developed or developing countries, any development on the 
environmental–income–trade nexus in one or more countries 
affects other countries.

5.2. Panel Unit Root Tests Results
As there is cross-sectional dependence in all variables, the 
stationarity properties of the series will be investigated by the 
second generation unit root tests. In this study, a CADF panel unit 
root test developed by Pesaran (2007) and a bootstrap panel unit root 
test developed by Smith et al. (2004) has been used to determine the 
stationarity properties of the variables. Cross-sectional dependence 
in the model has been also found, so cointegration analysis must 
that take into account cross-sectional dependence is used. The 
CIPS panel unit root test results for the developed and developing 
countries show that the null hypothesis for all variables is accepted 
at their levels of variables but the null hypothesis for all variables 
is rejected at their first differences. This means that all variables 
are stationary at their first differences (Table 3).

The Smith bootstrap panel unit root test results for both the 
developed countries indicate that the null hypothesis is accepted 
for all levels of the variables (Table 4). The test statistics for the 
first-differences strongly reject the null hypotheses, which imply 
that the variables are stationary in the first-difference form. The 
Smith bootstrap unit root test results depend on only the intercept 
model and intercept-trend model for developing countries indicate 
that the null hypothesis is accepted for all levels of the variables 
except for the tr variables. The test statistics for the first-differences 
strongly reject the null hypotheses, which imply that the variables 
are stationary in the first-difference form.

Table 2: Cross-section dependence test results for variables and models
Tests co2 gdp gdp

2 gdp3 tr Model
Developed countries

CD LM1 1178.543 (0.000) 1336.885 (0.000) 691.085 (0.000) 695.753 (0.000) 1344.930 (0.000) 1583.734 (0.000)
CD LM2 10.090 (0.000) 14.099 (0.000) 5.019 (0.000) 5.162 (0.000) 14.303 (0.000) 20.349 (0.000)
CD LM3 2.433 (0.000) 3.806 (0.000) −3.679 (0.000) −3.688 (0.000) 1.536 (0.062) 11.765 (0.000)

Developing countries
CD LM1 713.000 (0.000) 782.046 (0.000) 789.537 (0.000) 785.617 (0.000) 674.793 (0.000) 742.548 (0.000)
CD LM2 5.693 (0.000) 7.818 (0.000) 8.048 (0.000) 7.928 (0.000) 4.517 (0.000) 6.602 (0.000)
CD LM3 −2.565 (0.005) −2.906 (0.002) −2.921 (0.002) −2.892 (0.002) −1.830 (0.034) −1.494 (0.068)

P values are in ( )

Table 3: CIPS panel unit root test results
Models co2 gdp gdp

2 gdp3 tr
Developed countries

Level −2.066 −2.006 −1.937 −1.883 −2.156
1st difference −3.707 −2.869 −2.874 −2.859 −3.415

Model contains only intercept; critical value (1%) is −2.23
Level −2.272 −1.877 −1.836 −1.807 −2.640
1st difference −3.997 −3.190 −3.212 −3.203 −3.451

Model contains constant and trend; critical value (1%) is −2.73
Developing countries

Level −1.860 −1.729 −1.648 −1.641 −2.17
1st difference −3.543 −3.222 −3.081 −3.119 −3.596

Model contains only intercept; critical value (1%) is −2.30 
Level −1.867 −2.112 −2.004 −1.962 −2.405
1st difference −3.667 −3.600 −3.523 −3.491 −3.577

Model contains constant and trend; critical value (1%) is −2.81
Critical values (1%) are taken from Pesaran (2007) Table 2b. The maximum lag length is taken as 4 and optimal lag length is determined by the Schwarz information criteria



Acaravci and Akalin: Environment–economic Growth Nexus: A Comparative Analysis of Developed and Developing Countries

International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy | Vol 7 • Issue 5 • 201740

5.3. Panel Cointegration Test Results and the 
Estimated Long-run Coefficients
The unit root test results present that the integrated degree of the 
variables is one and this situation indicates a possible long-run 
cointegrating relationship among the carbon emissions per capita 
(co2), income per capita (gdp), and trade openness (tr). Therefore, 
a cointegration test is performed at the next stage.

The results of the Westerlund–Durbin–Hausman panel cointegration 
test are presented in Table 5. The results show that there is a long-
run relationship between the variables for both the developed and 
developing countries under the assumption of homogeneity in both 
are heterogeneous. This means that a long-term relationship exists 
among the non-stationary variables.

Table 6 presents the results from the CCE method for both 
the developed and developing countries. The results for the 
developed countries show that the findings are compatible with 
expectations and the literature. While the coefficients for the 
gdp3 and tr variables are statistically insignificant, the coefficient 
for the gdp variable is statistically significant and positive, 
and the coefficient for gdp2 variable is statistically significant 
and negative at a 5% level of significance. According to these 
results, there is evidence for validity of the EKC hypothesis 
in the developed countries. The level of carbon emissions first 
increases with income, stabilizes, and then declines. Thus, there 
appears to be an inverted U-shaped relationship between carbon 
emissions per capita and real GDP per capita in the developed 
countries.

The results for developing countries show that the coefficient of 
the tr variable is statistically insignificant, the coefficient of the 
gdp variable is significant and negative, the coefficient of the gdp2 
variable is significant and positive, and the coefficient of the gdp3 
variable is significant and negative at a 5% level of significance. 
These results indicate that the EKC hypothesis is not valid in the 
developing countries. There is an inverse N relationship between 
environmental pollution and income. The empirical results indicate 
that trade openness has no statistically significant impact on carbon 
emissions for both the developed and developing countries. This 
means that the increase of trade volume does not produce more 
carbon emissions.

6. CONCLUSIONS AND POLICY 
IMPLICATIONS

Since the early 1970s, especially after the United Nations 
Conference on the Human Environment in 1972, the relationship 
between production and environmental concerns has been handled 
by different methods in different disciplines. This is because 
the environment is of vital importance for human life, and they 
are confronted with serious environmental problems. The most 
important of these problems are as follows: The risk of going over 
the environmental pollution assimilation capacity; the difficulty 
in return of natural balance in the environment; large-scale health 
problems caused by environmental pollution; rapid depletion of 
natural resources; global warming and climate change, and the 

resulting related natural disasters such as floods; the reduction of 
biodiversity, air pollution, and soil pollution.

Empirical studies on the environmental pollution–economic 
growth nexus explore the validity of the EKC hypothesis which 
states that environmental pollution will increase up to a certain 
threshold of income growth, and after this threshold, will begin to 
decrease due to the demand for a clean environment and structural 
and technological inputs. If the EKC hypothesis is valid, economic 
growth is both cause of and solution to environmental pollution. 
This approach is often used when arguing that countries should not 
compromise economic growth policies to reduce environmental 
effects. The EKC hypothesis is not valid in cases where 
economic growth that increased production is the only cause of 
environmental pollution. This has accelerated the search to replace 
the neoclassical growth strategy. Especially highlighted by the 
1992 UNCED conference in Rio de Janeiro, a win-win approach to 
understanding the appropriate account of the ecological paradigm 
has gained importance in recent years. Therefore, the validity of 
the EKC hypothesis is an important issue in formulating economic 
growth policies for all countries.

In this study, the following two samples are used: (i) 40 high-
income countries (OECD members and non-members) and (ii) 33 
upper middle-income countries. These countries are selected 
according to data available from related income groups. The 
results from the dynamic panel data methods are as follows: 
(i) The Durbin–Hausman cointegration test shows that there is a 
long-term relationship between variables. (ii) The results from the 
CCE estimator indicate that there is evidence of validity of the 
EKC hypothesis in developed countries. (iii) The EKC hypothesis 
is not valid in the developing countries.

These results show that economic growth is sufficient enough 
to safeguard environmental quality for developed countries. 
However, developing countries have not yet reached income levels 
high enough to be able to derive their turning points. Therefore, to 
reduce environmental pollution that comes with economic growth, 
developing countries should give importance to R&D activities 
and institutionalization of environmental awareness. An increase 
in environmental awareness is imperative and developing and 
developed countries must not forget the fact that the natural world 
of tomorrow will be created today. Also, our findings show that 
trade liberalization is not harmful for the environment in developed 
and developing countries. This means that the increase of trade 
volume will not produce more carbon emissions. Despite the 
results obtained for the developed countries, we cannot assume 
that environmental betterment will continue to accompany further 
growth of per capita income in developed countries. So that, future 
studies can examine the relationship between economic growth 
and other pollutants. Because, along with the economic growth it 
may increase the amount of other pollutants.

The main contribution of this paper is that we avoid using 
econometric model that don’t taking into account cross sectional 
dependency. Previous, studies generally use econometric models 
that assume that cross sections are independent and are not able 
to consider the cross section dependency. However, in this case, 



Acaravci and Akalin: Environment–economic Growth Nexus: A Comparative Analysis of Developed and Developing Countries

International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy | Vol 7 • Issue 5 • 2017 41

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Acaravci and Akalin: Environment–economic Growth Nexus: A Comparative Analysis of Developed and Developing Countries

International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy | Vol 7 • Issue 5 • 201742

Table 5: Panel cointegration test results
Variables Developed countries Developing countries

t stat. (NW) P value t stat. (NW) P value
Durbin-H 
group stat.

128.629 0.000 1356.295 0.000

Durbin-H 
panel stat.

12.241 0.000 3.908 0.000

Table 6: The estimated long-run coefficients for the EKC 
model
Variables Developed countries Developing countries

Coefficients t stat (NW) Coefficients t stat (NW)
gdp 50.4683 2.0989 −101.9750 −3.3968
gdp2 −10.5701 −1.7850 29.9381 3.4916
gdp3 0.7278 1.5025 −2.8935 −3.5465
tr 0.0501 0.7160 −0.0872 −1.5952
Critical 
values (5%)

±1.645 ±1.645

EKC: Environmental Kuznets curve

traditional panel estimator can produce misleading or even 
inconsistent parameters (Chudik and Pesaran, 2013). While, there 
is no study in the literature using sample types and econometric 
models as same as this paper, it is possible to say that our findings 
are consistent with Moomaw and Unhruh (1997), Ang (2007), 
Shahbaz et al. (2013), Mensah (2014), Ahmed et al. (2016). On 
the contrary, our findings are not consistent with He and Richard 
(2009), Narayan and Narayan (2010), Farhani and Rejeb (2012), 
Mamun et al. (2014), Dogan and Turkekul (2016), Saidi and 
Mbarek (2017).

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