Examining the non-linear impact of fossil and renewable energy consumption on Vietnam’s ecological footprint: insights from the asymmetric ARDL approach

Vietnam’s economy is rapidly growing, marked by an increasing reliance on fossil fuels and renewable energy sources, resulting in unsustainable consumption patterns. The primary objective is to investigate the implications of renewable and non-renewable resource consumption on the overall resource availability over the long term, as indicated by the ecological footprint. Furthermore, the study incorporates economic growth to examine the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis in Vietnam. Methodologically, the study adopts the asymmetric Autoregressive Distributed Lag model, utilizing time-series data ranging from 1986 to 2022. The findings highlight that Vietnam’s economic growth still use more natural resources while compromising the overall ecological reserve. Furthermore, the research findings suggest that the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis does not hold in the context of Vietnam. Specifically, the increasing share of primary energy sourced from fossil fuels is observed to coincide with an increase in demand in ecological footprint. In contrast, an increase in primary energy consumption from renewable sources demonstrates a marked reduction in natural resource demand over the long term. Several strategies are recommended to enhance the resilience of environmental resources, such as adopting new and energy-efficient technologies is necessary within the industrial sector, promote the utilization of renewable energy sources, enhance waste management systems, transition from conventional energy to renewable sources in both production and consumption and the formulation of legislation on renewable energy usage.