Testing the nuclear energy induced environmental Kuznets curve for Bulgaria: An ARDL bounds test with sharp and smooth breaks

Attaining sustainable development entails extensive use of clean energy and low levels of carbon emissions. Hence, nuclear energy is considered an avenue to reach higher levels of sustainable development. However, the existing literature documents the ambivalent conclusion on the nuclear energy-emissions nexus. To solve this puzzle, the present study re-investigates the nuclear energy-emissions nexus for Bulgaria using the Environmental Kuznets Curve framework. We adopt the methodology of novel bootstrap ARDL with sharp and smooth structural breaks. The findings document that nuclear energy is responsible for waning emissions across the long and short-run. Also, we validate the EKC hypothesis. To provide robust empirical findings, we perform a sensitivity analysis, which reports results similar to the baseline findings. Hence, we propose to escalate the adoption of nuclear energy to curb emissions.