Trade-Offs for the Optimal Energy Efficiency of Road Transportation: Domestic Cases in Developing Countries

Usman Akbar, Muhammad Asif Khan, Marryum Akmal, Éva Zsuzsanna Tóth Naárné and Judit Oláh
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Usman Akbar: School of Economics and Management, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China
Muhammad Asif Khan: Department of Commerce, Faculty of Management Sciences, University of Kotli, Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Kotli 11100, Pakistan
Marryum Akmal: School of Economics and Management, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China
Éva Zsuzsanna Tóth Naárné: Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences, Szent István University, Páter Károly u. 1, 2100 Gödöllő, Hungary
Judit Oláh: Department of Management, Faculty of Applied Sciences, WSB University, 41-300 Dabrowa Górnicza, Poland

Energies, 2020, vol. 13, issue 24, 1-14

Abstract: The increase in domestic transportation in developing countries may adversely affect the energy efficiency of road transportation due to effective productivity and carbon dioxide emissions (CO 2 ). When evaluating quantitatively the countries on the efficiency frontier, poor efficiency can still be seen sometimes due to the slack available in undesirable output measures. This paper uses desirable and undesirable output variables, such as passenger-kilometers (PKM), tones-kilometers (TKM), and carbon dioxide (CO 2 ), to compute the weakly efficient decision-making units (DMUs). The data envelopment analysis (DEA) technology is used to assess the efficiencies of the decision-making units (DMUs), which are countries in our case. Then, the trade-off method with efficient binding surfaces is used to attain the optimal efficiencies of the weakly efficient DMUs. The marginal rates aid this trade-off analysis. Resultantly, such marginal trade-offs do not deteriorate the efficiency of the DMUs below the frontier line. We calculate the maximum change (margin) in a specific variable amount when another variable’s amount is changed. Thus, such a computation gives us different margins, with which each output variable can be a traded off to bring a DMU further toward the closest optimal point possible. The marginal trade-off can help the managers and policymakers in effective decision-making, and it is further recommended to address efficiency damages (by the undesired outputs).

Keywords: data envelopment analysis; trade-offs; efficiency; road transportations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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