A Regression Analysis of the Carbon Footprint of Megacities

John A. Paravantis, Panagiotis D. Tasios, Vasileios Dourmas, Georgios Andreakos, Konstantinos Velaoras, Nikoletta Kontoulis and Panagiota Mihalakakou
Additional contact information
John A. Paravantis: Department of International and European Studies, University of Piraeus, 185 34 Piraeus, Greece
Panagiotis D. Tasios: Department of Physics, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, 157 84 Athens, Greece
Vasileios Dourmas: Department of Environmental Engineering, University of Patras, 301 00 Agrinio, Greece
Georgios Andreakos: Department of Environmental Engineering, University of Patras, 301 00 Agrinio, Greece
Konstantinos Velaoras: Department of Environmental Engineering, University of Patras, 301 00 Agrinio, Greece
Nikoletta Kontoulis: Department of International and European Studies, University of Piraeus, 185 34 Piraeus, Greece
Panagiota Mihalakakou: Department of Environmental Engineering, University of Patras, 301 00 Agrinio, Greece

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 3, 1-24

Abstract: Urbanization and climate change are two major issues that humanity faces in the 21st century. Megacities are large urban agglomerations with more than 10 million inhabitants that emerged in the 20th century. The world’s top 100 economies include many North and South American megacities, such as New York, Los Angeles, Mexico City, Sao Paulo and Buenos Aires; European cities such as London and Paris; and Asian cities such as Tokyo, Osaka, Seoul, Beijing and Mumbai. This paper addresses a dearth of megacity energy metabolism models in the literature. Cross-sectional data for 36 global megacities were collected from many literature and Internet sources. Variables included megacity name, country and region; population; area; population density; (per capita) GDP; income inequality measures; (per capita) energy consumption; household electricity prices; (per capita) carbon and ecological footprint; degree days; average urban heat island intensity; and temperature and precipitation. A descriptive comparison of the characteristics of megacities was followed by ordinary least squares with heteroskedasticity-robust standard errors that were used to estimate four alternative multiple regression models. The per-capita carbon footprint of megacities was positively associated with the megacity GDP per capita, and the megacity ecological footprint; and negatively associated with country income inequality, a low-income country dummy, the country household electricity price, and the megacity annual precipitation. Targeted policies are needed, but more policy autonomy should be left to megacities. Collecting longitudinal data for megacities is very challenging but should be a next step to overcome misspecification and bias issues that plague cross-sectional approaches.

Keywords: megacities; carbon footprint; regression (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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