The Effects of Foreign Direct Investment, Economic Growth, Industrial Structure, Renewable and Nuclear Energy, and Urbanization on Korean Greenhouse Gas Emissions

This study analyzes the effects of foreign direct investment (FDI), economic growth, industrial structure, renewable and nuclear energy, and urbanization on Korean greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from 1981 to 2014. The cointegration relationship of the variables is examined using autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds test. The test confirmed the long-run equilibrium among the variables. After that, the short-run and long-run coefficients are estimated by an ARDL error-correction model. The result shows that in the long run, economic growth and urbanization are the main contributors to the increase of GHG emissions, while manufacturing industry share, renewable energy and nuclear energy contributed to the reduction of GHG emissions. The inflow of FDI has led to the increase of greenhouse gases, but the coefficients is negligible. In the short run, economic growth has caused an increase in GHG emissions, while renewable and nuclear energy have contributed to the reduction in GHG emissions. FDI and urbanization did not play a role in increasing of GHG emissions in the short term.