Victor Moutinho

A new LDMI decomposition approach to explain emission development in the EU: individual and set contribution

This study breaks down carbon emissions into six effects within the current 28 European Union (EU) countries group, thereafter, they are divided into two different groups (the first 15 countries (EU-15) and the last 13 entering the EU (EU13)). Country-specific highlights are also examined. It analyses the evolution of the effects using a data span that runs from 1990 to 2014, to determine which of them had more impact on the intensity of emissions, while also breaking down the complete period into two distinct periods (before the Kyoto protocol (1990–2004) and after Kyoto (2005–2014)). In order to add more knowledge to the current literature, both the additive and multiplicative decomposition techniques were used to examine carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and the selected six components: carbon intensity, fossil fuel consumption, energy intensity, oil imports intensity, oil dependence, and population effect. Results point to different adapting velocities for Kyoto targets and necessary compromises. The different velocities were translated into different positive and negative impacts in the change of behavior of CO2 emissions throughout Europe. A stress in the fluctuations in CO2 variations before and after Kyoto and between the two different groups of EU countries could be noticed. Moreover, energy intensity and per capita dependence of oil products were identified as the major responsible components for the total and negative changes of emissions in recent years. A decrease in total changes of emissions is observed due to the fossil fuel energy consumption effect and total petroleum products effects. It is possible to infer from here that increased renewable capacity is contributing in a positive way to eco-efficiency, and should therefore be accounted for in national policymakers’ decisions in the strongest way possible. Results also seem to indicate that per capita dependence of oil products has decreased, despite oil imports intensity constancy and increased renewable capacity, however, with clear heterogeneous effects, worthy of consideration when defining policies.

Advanced scoring method of eco-efficiency in European cities

This paper analyzes a set of selected German and French cities’ performance in terms of the relative behavior of their eco-efficiencies, computed as the ratio of their gross domestic product (GDP) over their CO2 emissions. For this analysis, eco-efficiency scores of the selected cities are computed using the data envelopment analysis (DEA) technique, taking the eco-efficiencies as outputs, and the inputs being the energy consumption, the population density, the labor productivity, the resource productivity, and the patents per inhabitant. Once DEA results are analyzed, the Malmquist productivity indexes (MPI) are used to assess the time evolution of the technical efficiency, technological efficiency, and productivity of the cities over the window periods 2000 to 2005 and 2005 to 2008. Some of the main conclusions are that (1) most of the analyzed cities seem to have suboptimal scales, being one of the causes of their inefficiency; (2) there is evidence that high GDP over CO2 emissions does not imply high eco-efficiency scores, meaning that DEA like approaches are useful to complement more simplistic ranking procedures, pointing out potential inefficiencies at the input levels; (3) efficiencies performed worse during the period 2000–2005 than during the period 2005–2008, suggesting the possibility of corrective actions taken during or at the end of the first period but impacting only on the second period, probably due to an increasing environmental awareness of policymakers and governors; and (4) MPI analysis shows a positive technological evolution of all cities, according to the general technological evolution of the reference cities, reflecting a generalized convergence of most cities to their technological frontier and therefore an evolution in the right direction.

Differences between stayers, switchers, and heavy switchers: A study in the telecommunications service market

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to identify and compare different groups of customers’ perceptions (i.e. stayers, switchers, and heavy switchers) of several loyalty antecedents such as satisfaction, trust, service quality, switching costs, marketing communication, and loyalty itself. Design/methodology/approach This study was carried out based on data collected through a questionnaire from 353 telecommunication services users in Portugal and using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and analysis of variance. Findings The three types of customers – stayers, switchers, and heavy switchers – clearly differ among themselves. Stayers differ from switchers regarding their communication efforts perceptions, and from heavy switchers in their loyalty, satisfaction, and trust levels. Switchers differ from heavy switchers in their loyalty levels. Research limitations/implications Future research should examine differences between customers taking into account the impact of their personality, price sensitiveness, and orientation toward the adoption of new technologies. Practical implications As there are several differences among stayers, switchers, and heavy switchers, companies should not only recognize the heterogeneity of their customer base, but also target their marketing efforts accordingly. Originality/value This study is one of the few identifying groups of customers perception’s toward service providers. It also complements previous research by splitting them intro three different groups and by analyzing their behaviors across a set of previously unexamined marketing variables.

Effects decomposition: separation of carbon emissions decoupling and decoupling effort in aggregated EU-15

The ecological burden of economic growth is a highly discussed issue. In this article, we focus on the set of European Union (EU) 15 countries in the period 1995–2014. We first decomposed emissions into six effects and afterward the decoupling-effort index was used to calculate the magnitude of impact that each factor has on it, considering the country group. For the group of the EU-15 in the pre-Kyoto period, CO2 changes are only negative in 1998 and 1999 considering the initial view (with respect to the base year of 1995), being positive for all the other years. This positive effect means increased emissions, for which many contributed the positive and significant effects of income per capita and the population effects. The most significant reductions in CO2 changes are verified in the years after the effective Kyoto commitment and observed mainly in the alternative view (year to year changes), for which many contributed the negative and significant effects of carbon intensity of petroleum products, energy intensity and conversion efficiency in the overall period. The effects elasticity decoupling and decoupling effort do not seem to be controlled by the internal drivers of CO2 emissions. Policy makers should bet in policy instruments pointed in the sense of strengthening energy efficiency, in reducing petroleum products consumption and therefore dependency and on the structure of added value generated by the economy.

The environment–growth dilemma: new evidence using a panel cointegration approach

ABSTRACT This paper contributes to the literature by extending the long-run and the causal relationship between greenhouse gas emissions, energy consumption and economic growth to a panel of 13 Portuguese economic sectors over the period 1975–2013. Hence, we test for the case of Portugal whether a relationship between economic activity and emissions exists, and what configuration that relation assumes, accounting for the structure of the economic activity, an aspect that has been neglected in previous literature. The sectoral approach followed in the study allows to account for the likely heterogeneity at sectoral level, to account for the structure of the economic activity and its changes over time, leading to an environment-economic analysis complementary to other findings. In this respect, the research on the relationship between emissions, energy consumption and economic growth carried out in this paper may be of relevance for policy-makers to better understand the energy–environment–growth dynamics. Such knowledge may support the design and implementation of more effective policies, which contribute to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases while preserving economic growth.

Efficiency in the European agricultural sector: environment and resources

This article intends to compute agriculture technical efficiency scores of 27 European countries during the period 2005–2012, using both data envelopment analysis (DEA) and stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) with a generalized cross-entropy (GCE) approach, for comparison purposes. Afterwards, by using the scores as dependent variable, we apply quantile regressions using a set of possible influencing variables within the agricultural sector able to explain technical efficiency scores. Results allow us to conclude that although DEA and SFA are quite distinguishable methodologies, and despite attained results are different in terms of technical efficiency scores, both are able to identify analogously the worst and better countries. They also suggest that it is important to include resources productivity and subsidies in determining technical efficiency due to its positive and significant exerted influence.

Fossil fuel power generation and economic growth in Poland

ABSTRACT This paper explores the energy (electricity)–economic growth nexus in the case of Poland. The empirical investigation sheds some new light on the relationship between the electricity production from fossil fuel sources (oil, coal, and natural gas) and economic growth based on cointegration and Granger causality analyses with yearly data covering the period 1970–2014. Electricity generation from coal sources is likely to have a strong and positive impact upon economic growth in the long run. The Granger causality analysis supports the conservation hypothesis for the electricity production from natural gas sources, and the neutrality hypothesis for the use of oil and coal in the electric power energy mix. Therefore, it is inferred that energy conservation policies are not likely to harm economic growth and the same policies can be applied for all energy sources. The results complement previous findings in the literature despite differences in methods and data collection.

Innovative Accounting Approach for environmental, energy and economic variables for Portuguese and Spanish sectors

The Iberian Peninsula is one of the European regions most affected by climate change (European Environmental Agency). Given the peculiarity of these two countries (Portugal and Spain) in the integration of the electricity market and on the similarity of energy and environmental policies adopted in both, it is relevant to study the relationship between variables such as CO2 emissions, energy consumption, and economic growth in the past and predict their relationship in the future. Panel VAR was implemented, including forecast error variance decomposition and impulse response functions, using data from 1975 to 2012 for selected economic sectors. It was noticed that as CO2 decreases, energy consumption decreases in the short-run, but economic activity increases, may be due to the mix of fossil fuels used in economic activity. Reducing energy consumption changes CO2 emissions with simultaneous change in technology used in energy resources. Results also reveal differences among the two countries.

A Comparison between the Presence and Absence of Regulation in the Spanish Electricity Market

There is an important gap in the literature on the promotion of competition in electricity markets in what pertains to the analysis of two different streams: the absence and presence of regulation. Accordingly, the main objective of this study is to analyze the interactions among market power indexes, marginal costs, and bidding strategies in the two mentioned scenarios, for comparative purposes. The methodology used is based on panel cointegration methods. The results point to the significant inclusion of different bidding strategies in the retail market: (i) fuel prices exercise a differential impact on the power plants’ marginal costs, (ii) the marginal costs have a significantly positive effect on quantity sold and on net quantity, and (iii) the market power measures under regulation have a significantly positive long-term impact on the quantity sold and a negative impact on net quantity supplied in wholesale market. Although there is some literature on this issue, the main novelty of this article is the discussion of the regula‐ tory implications that could have been adopted in order to control and mitigate the market power, to encourage new investments in new technologies, and to recover sunk costs with the transition to a competitive market.

Economic and environmental efficiency in Europe: Evidence from a new stochastic frontier model

This study aims to evaluate the resource and environment efficiency problem of European countries. We specify a new stochastic frontier model where Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is considered as the desirable output and Greenhouse Gases (GHG) emissions as the undesirable output. Capital, Labour, Fossil fuels and Renewable Energy consumption are regarded as inputs. The study is divided into two distinct periods, 2000-2004 and 2005-2011, in order to evaluate the difference between efficiency levels before and after the establishment of environmental targets related with the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol in 2005. A maximum entropy approach to assess technical efficiency is discussed.