IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/socsci/v95y2014i3p795-816.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Urbanization and Carbon Emissions: A Nationwide Study of Local Countervailing Effects in the United States

Author

Listed:
  • James R. Elliott
  • Matthew Thomas Clement

Abstract

type="main"> This study advances a theoretical framework for examining the impact of urbanization on local carbon emissions over space and time. It conceptualizes urbanization at the local level as a set of three distinct but related subprocesses of population concentration, land-use intensification, and systemic interaction, which join together to exert countervailing effects on local carbon emissions. To test this framework we conduct cross-sectional and panel regression analyses of carbon emissions at the county level across the continental United States, controlling for spatial autocorrelation. Findings strongly support our framework and show how different dimensions of urbanization push against one another at the local level to influence carbon emissions in ways that exert far more consistent effects than household density and alternative transit use. These findings illuminate the complexities of urbanization as a local force of environmental transformation with increasingly global consequences.

Suggested Citation

  • James R. Elliott & Matthew Thomas Clement, 2014. "Urbanization and Carbon Emissions: A Nationwide Study of Local Countervailing Effects in the United States," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 95(3), pages 795-816, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:socsci:v:95:y:2014:i:3:p:795-816
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/ssqu.12079
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Richard York, 2012. "Do alternative energy sources displace fossil fuels?," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 2(6), pages 441-443, June.
    2. Clinton Andrews, 2008. "Greenhouse gas emissions along the rural-urban gradient," Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(6), pages 847-870.
    3. Liddle, Brantley & Lung, Sidney, 2010. "Age-Structure, Urbanization, and Climate Change in Developed Countries: Revisiting STIRPAT for Disaggregated Population and Consumption-Related Environmental Impacts," MPRA Paper 59579, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Matthew Thomas Clement & Nathan W. Pino & Jarrett Blaustein, 2019. "Homicide Rates and the Multiple Dimensions of Urbanization: A Longitudinal, Cross-National Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(20), pages 1-16, October.
    2. Chen, Shiyi & Jin, Hao & Lu, Yulin, 2019. "Impact of urbanization on CO2 emissions and energy consumption structure: A panel data analysis for Chinese prefecture-level cities," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 107-119.
    3. Deka, Devajyoti, 2018. "Exploration of millennials' perception of spending on cities, mass transit, and highways," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 224-232.
    4. Andrew K Jorgenson & Jennifer Givens, 2015. "The Changing Effect of Economic Development on the Consumption-Based Carbon Intensity of Well-Being, 1990–2008," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(5), pages 1-14, May.
    5. Wang, Yan, 2020. "Urban land and sustainable resource use: Unpacking the countervailing effects of urbanization on water use in China, 1990–2014," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Liddle, Brantley & Sadorsky, Perry, 2017. "How much does increasing non-fossil fuels in electricity generation reduce carbon dioxide emissions?," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 197(C), pages 212-221.
    2. Claudia García-García & Catalina B. García-García & Román Salmerón, 2021. "Confronting collinearity in environmental regression models: evidence from world data," Statistical Methods & Applications, Springer;Società Italiana di Statistica, vol. 30(3), pages 895-926, September.
    3. Liddle, Brantley, 2013. "Population, Affluence, and Environmental Impact Across Development: Evidence from Panel Cointegration Modeling," MPRA Paper 52088, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Gregory Casey & Oded Galor, 2016. "Is economic growth compatible with reductions in carbon emissions? Investigating the impacts of diminished population growth," Working Papers 2016-8, Brown University, Department of Economics.
    5. Li, Kunming & Fang, Liting & He, Lerong, 2019. "How population and energy price affect China's environmental pollution?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 386-396.
    6. Ahmed, Khalid, 2015. "The sheer scale of China’s urban renewal and CO2 emissions: Multiple structural breaks, long-run relationship and short-run dynamics," MPRA Paper 71035, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Marietta Markiewicz & Łukasz Muślewski, 2019. "The Impact of Powering an Engine with Fuels from Renewable Energy Sources including its Software Modification on a Drive Unit Performance Parameters," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(23), pages 1-16, November.
    8. Ajayi, Temitope & Awolayo, Adedapo & Gomes, Jorge S. & Parra, Humberto & Hu, Jialiang, 2019. "Large scale modeling and assessment of the feasibility of CO2 storage onshore Abu Dhabi," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 185(C), pages 653-670.
    9. Matthew Houser, 2022. "Does adopting a nitrogen best management practice reduce nitrogen fertilizer rates?," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 39(1), pages 79-94, March.
    10. Lei Liu & Yue Xu & Zhaotian Yang & Ying Li, 2023. "The interrelationship between environmental NGO development and environmental condition in China," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 25(8), pages 8487-8516, August.
    11. Lin, Boqiang & Li, Xuehui, 2011. "The effect of carbon tax on per capita CO2 emissions," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(9), pages 5137-5146, September.
    12. Poumanyvong, Phetkeo & Kaneko, Shinji & Dhakal, Shobhakar, 2012. "Impacts of urbanization on national transport and road energy use: Evidence from low, middle and high income countries," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 268-277.
    13. Magazzino, Cosimo & Drago, Carlo & Schneider, Nicolas, 2023. "Evidence of supply security and sustainability challenges in Nigeria’s power sector," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    14. Chulin Pan & Huayi Wang & Hongpeng Guo & Hong Pan, 2021. "How Do the Population Structure Changes of China Affect Carbon Emissions? An Empirical Study Based on Ridge Regression Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(6), pages 1-16, March.
    15. Maliyamu Abudureheman & Qingzhe Jiang & Xiucheng Dong & Cong Dong, 2022. "CO 2 Emissions in China: Does the Energy Rebound Matter?," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-25, June.
    16. Bingquan Liu & Boyang Nie & Yakun Wang & Xuemin Han & Yongqing Li, 2023. "Does New Infrastructure Affect Regional Carbon Intensity? Empirical Evidence from China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(24), pages 1-20, December.
    17. Lars Sorge & Anne Neumann, 2019. "The Impact of Population, Affluence, Technology, and Urbanization on CO2 Emissions across Income Groups," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1812, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    18. Liu, Qingrui & Tang, Lu, 2022. "Research on the accelerating effect of green finance on the transformation of energy consumption in China," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    19. Dong, Qichen & Lin, Yongyi & Huang, Jieyu & Chen, Zhongfei, 2020. "Has urbanization accelerated PM2.5 emissions? An empirical analysis with cross-country data," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 59(C).
    20. Avri Eitan, 2021. "Promoting Renewable Energy to Cope with Climate Change—Policy Discourse in Israel," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(6), pages 1-17, March.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:socsci:v:95:y:2014:i:3:p:795-816. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0038-4941 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.