Performance improvement of energy extraction and energy utilization to reduce carbon emissions in resource-rich Belt and Road Initiative countries: Applying a meta two-stage non-radial dynamic DEA model

Countries along China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) have seen annual increases in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, with developmental energy demands heavily reliant on fossil fuels. As the abundance of fossil energy resources has been a significant contributor to BRI countries' economic development, assessing and improving fossil energy efficiency is of substantial importance. This study employs a Meta Two-Stage Dynamic Non-radial data envelopment analysis, examining 35 key fossil energy-producing BRI countries. In the first stage, we use natural resource rents as inputs to evaluate fossil energy extraction efficiency, while CO2 emissions are the output in the second stage that examines fossil energy utilization efficiency, providing a comprehensive evaluation of carbon emissions and fossil energy efficiency. The findings indicate that overall energy efficiency is 0.77, with efficiency values of 0.69 and 0.84 for the first and second stages, respectively. Inefficiency is primarily attributable to low energy production efficiency, exhibiting little to no improvement or even declines in energy efficiency over the past decade. Furthermore, European and Middle Eastern regions exhibit the highest efficiency, while the Americas and Asia are in a state of normal fluctuation. Conversely, the efficiency in Africa and Commonwealth of Independent States regions has significantly deteriorated. Notably, the gap in energy extraction technology between low-income countries and the overall sample is widening. Based on these results, we propose policy recommendations for efficiency improvement, including enhancing international cooperation and exchanges within the BRI framework and extending the fossil energy industrial chain.