FACTORS LEADING TO INCREASED CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSIONS OF THE APEC COUNTRIES: THE LMDI DECOMPOSITION ANALYSIS

This paper explores the factors that lead to increased carbon dioxide emissions in the 18 countries of the APEC. We apply the LMDI multiplicative decomposing method to 18 countries between 1971 and 2012. We summarize these factors that are as follows: (1) population increase and economic growth play a key role in increased carbon dioxide emissions. (2) All the 18 countries of the APEC have improved their energy efficiency as manifested in the change of energy intensity (Delta I), which is less than 1 in the 42 years; (3) In terms of energy substitution effect (Delta M) and fuel coefficient effect (Delta CE), the decomposition results point out that Hong Kong, Indonesia, and Malaysia witnessed growth in Delta M and Delta CE, indicating the only factor to reduce the emissions for these three countries is intensity effect, which gives rise to relatively higher emission for these three countries during the period. In the case of Peru, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam, we witnessed increases in Delta M, but decreases in Delta CE; In the case of Australia, Canada, Chile, China, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, New Zealand, Taiwan, and the US, there seem to decrease in Delta M, but increases in Delta CE during the 42-year period.