Decomposing the decoupling of CO2 emission from economic growth in BRICS countries

Nowadays, BRICS (i.e., Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) becomes more and more important in the world in terms of not only economic development, but also energy consumption. The purpose of this paper is to study occurrence of a decoupling between economic growth and energy-related CO2 emission in BRICS countries from 1995 to 2014. Furthermore, the LMDI theory is utilized to find the decoupling reasons. The main conclusions drawn from the present study may be summarized as follows: (1) During the study period, China was the largest CO2 emitter among BRICS countries; per capita energy-related CO2 emission in Russia was the largest in BRICS countries. (2) The share of fossil energy to total energy consumption for South Africa accounted for more than 96 %. However, the share of fossil energy to total energy consumption for Brazil accounted for about 60 % over the study period. (3) For Brazil, Russia, and South Africa, five decoupling status occurred during the study period. However, only three decoupling status occurred in China and India. (4) The energy intensity effect played a positive role in decreasing CO2 emission in all five BRICS countries.