Examining the empirical basis of environmental Kuznets curves in China

Abstract

This paper is an empirical study on the relationship between economic growth and environmental emission (air pollution), using a dataset from the largest manufacturing country, China. Three air pollutants – NO_x emission, SO_2 emission, CO_2 emission-are considered. Some of the results support the existence of the standard environmental Kuznets curve (EKC). More specifically, with first difference estimations, I find an inverted “U” relationship between emissions and GDP, indicating that the environment deteriorates before improving with economic growth. But the alternative EKC model which, includes cubic term of log GDP per capita and a time trend shows us an inverted “N” shape curve, which means the environment first improves, then gradually deteriorates and finally improves with economic growth.