Search

Energy companies are facing increasing pressure from institutional and industry stakeholders to prioritize their responsibility to the environment and society, including providing accurate, reliable, and comprehensive reports on their sustainability practices. Three metrics were developed in this study: the average sustainability reporting score and two sustainability performance reporting indices based on two different performance measurement methodologies. These were designed to assess the effect of mandatory non-financial disclosure on sustainability reporting and the level of transparency and engagement of energy companies. The study also examined the relationship between the level of sustainability reporting and sustainability performance in the period of 2016–2019 by correlating these metrics. The analysis sheds light on the effectiveness of non-financial disclosure regulations in promoting sustainability practices in the energy industry. The results revealed no difference in metric scores prior to, or even following, the adoption of Directive 2014/95/EU. Energy companies performed better in terms of sustainability when more indicators were reported. Their primary focus was on the economic aspect of sustainability, particularly corruption. They gave less importance to the environmental aspect, mainly reporting on emissions. The social aspect received the least attention, although indicators for employee education and training were mentioned most frequently. The analysis showed that the metrics are statistically significantly correlated and complement each other, highlighting the need to consider a variety of metrics when assessing sustainability performance in the energy industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the impact of climate policy uncertainty (CPU) on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of 1007 listed firms over 2003–2021. As the urgency to combat climate change and implement effective policies may create uncertainty, it focuses on the Unites States, a significant emitter with a complex policy landscape. Using the two‐step system generalized method of moments estimation, the analysis reveals a negative CPU–CO2 emissions relationship, indicating that increased CPU incentivizes firms to adopt sustainable practices, leading to emissions reductions. Capital expenditures have similar effects on emissions, accompanied by increased corporate sustainability engagement. However, no significant relationship is found between research and development (R&D) expenditure and CO2 emissions, nor does CPU significantly moderate the R&D–CO2 emissions nexus. Firms with substantial fixed assets exhibit higher CO2 emissions, while heavy emitters demonstrate limited CPU responsiveness. These findings provide valuable insights for policymakers encouraging corporate participation in emissions reduction efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores low-carbon behavior (LCB), considering a number of psychological predictors deemed important according to the theory of planned behavior and the norm-activation model. Four distinct clusters were identified by conducting a cluster analysis of data collected from an online survey of young people in Croatia in 2022, revealing both consistent and inconsistent patterns of LCB. The study highlights the complexity of factors influencing LCB and utilizes a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis to identify specific configurations of psychological variables that contribute to high and not-high levels of LCB within each cluster. The results validate the significance of established psychological determinants in explaining variations in low-carbon intentions and behaviors among young people, challenging the assumption of intention as the single best determinant of LCB and underscoring the presence of multiple causal complexities and equifinalities. Furthermore, the study demonstrates the asymmetric effects of different psychological conditions on high and not-high levels of LCB, suggesting that consistent and inconsistent LCBs cannot simply be viewed as opposite poles of the same continuum and that a variety of pathways can be explored to enhance carbon reduction activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper empirically evaluates the impact of environment stringency policy, business regulations, policy and economic uncertainty, and real GDP per capita on foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows by employing the autoregressive distributed lag approach and using data from 2000 to 2015. Specifically, we focus on two groups of countries with different economic development, the Group of Seven (G7) and the BRICS countries, and the composite indices of business and environmental regulations and policy-induced uncertainty, along with real gross domestic capital (GDP) per capita, were selected to reflect the multidimensionality of the settings in the selected countries. Our results indicate that only the effect of real GDP per capita turned out to be homogenous and statistically significant across different income groups and time horizons. Findings also show that more friendly business regulations significantly encourage FDI inflows in the long run, but there is a bottom line. When regulations are already at a low level, as is the case with G7 countries, further liberalization would adversely affect FDI inflows. Furthermore, more stringent environmental regulations have a marginally adverse effect on FDI inflows only in the long run. At the same time, they weakly support the pollution haven hypothesis. The impact of policy-induced uncertainty on investment is adverse but largely nonsignificant in the short run. It appears that cross-border investments follow a pattern of the safe-haven effect to avoid uncertainty in the long run. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic growth is considered to be an essential means for poverty alleviation and improving countries' well‐being. Disturbances and instability in the banking sector may jeopardize financial stability and generate adverse, considerable and long‐lasting consequences therefor. This study analyzed the dynamic and causal effects of various indicators of banking sector stability on economic growth by employing new generation panel cointegration and causality tests in post‐transition European Union countries over the period 1998–2016. Taking into account cross‐sectional dependence between countries, the presence of heterogeneity in the errors, endogeneity and structural breaks, the long and short run analyses revealed the cointegration relation between the variables, the statistically significant positive effect of banking sector stability on economic growth and the efficiency of the error correction mechanism. The causality analysis disclosed the opposite causality direction between the particular banking sector stability indicators and economic growth, suggesting that banking sector stability is a complex, hierarchically structured multidimensional construct. Its different dimensions require different policy responses aiming at preventing future shocks and mitigating the adverse effects, while encouraging economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article aims to explore internal migration flows, test for economic convergence, and assess the effects of internal migration (net and gross) on convergence and growth in terms of a neoclassical model in Croatia in the period 2000 to 2011. Croatia is a country with significant and persistent regional economic disparities, migration, and turbulent economic and political changes. The main findings of panel data analysis with fixed effects show that (i) contrary to the expectations based on neoclassical theory, the Croatian counties have been facing absolute and conditional economic divergence; (ii) in- and out-migration works symmetrically; (iii) net migration mainly appears to be a force that accelerates divergence, just opposite to gross in- and out-migration; (iv) although the estimated parameters of net and gross migration have expected signs, their effect size lies in the range from statistically significant but minor to insignificant; and (v) migrant characteristics and behavior matter when the effect size is considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By using partial least squares path modeling, this paper develops a complex index of social capital, selects Croatia as the case for testing and validating the index, and investigates the regional distribution of social capital. The social capital index is defined as a complex hierarchical structured construct of third-order with social trust, participation, and civism as its core dimensions. The main results indicate that civism is the most important cause of social capital followed by active participation and social trust. As far as the regional distribution of social capital is concerned, there are statistically significant differences across the Croatian regions. Although the lowest or below the national average level of social capital and its dimensions can be mostly found in the least developed regions (with the exception of the capital), the highest level of social capital and its particular dimensions is not achieved in the most developed regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main aim of this paper is to analyse the motives affecting the migration decisions of young people, particularly university students. Two scales were developed for measuring the perception of the importance of these motives. The data used in the research were collected via a survey of the opinions and attitudes of university students in Osijek, in June 2010. The paper also analyses psychometric properties of the scales - their dimensionality and reliability. The results of a confirmatory factor analysis undoubtedly indicate that both scales are multidimensional constructs. A combination of the results of t-tests for an independent sample, factor analysis (exploratory and confirmatory) and reliability analysis suggest that emigration and stay motives are two sides of the same migration decision, and that they can be classified into several factors: the economic situation, social networks, insider advantages (that can be divided into inherited amenities and public-safety conditions) and the wealth of opportunities. Depending on the power of the initial and target destination, the factors can function as 'push' or 'pull' factors. The results of the study show social networks as being the only 'pull' factor for the city of Osijek, whereas the other factors, especially the economic ones, proved to demonstrate the 'push' effect. However, the effects of all factors were very mild. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the pass-through of different monetary policy channels to inflation in Croatia between January 1998 and December 2009. Using a four-step procedure: unit root test, co-integration test, Granger causality and innovation accounting techniques, we find that (i) interest rates, credits and the nominal exchange rate do not Granger-cause inflation individually; however, they do with nominal M1 money supply jointly at lag two; (ii) the nominal effective exchange rate is the most important pass-through to inflation statistically, accounting for approximately 11% of forecast error variance after four years; (iii) credits and nominal M1 have very small portions in explaining variations in the total variance of inflation; and (iv) the nominal interest rate is the weakest but statistically significant channel to inflation in the long run. These results are discussed within the Croatian monetary framework and future developments of monetary channels in Central and Eastern European countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For an industry to succeed in a competitive market, it should continuously take care of not only its stakeholders but also its technical efficiency and productivity. In this paper, data envelopment analysis was combined with Malmquist productivity analysis to investigate the pattern of multifactor productivity changes in the European energy industry over the period from 2005–2016. The results showed that the whole industry was technically inefficient and had large potential for improvement. A slight average increase in productivity that was observed over the studied period proved to be sensitive to the financial and economic situation and equally sensitive to technological and efficiency advances. As for efficiency gains, they reflected the nature of the energy industry, implying that they were due to scale efficiencies rather than human resource improvements. Although technological innovation and the optimal scale of production increased productivity, the slow pace at which this occurred and the negative outlook highlighted by the observed trends call for more serious consideration of the future productivity deployment of the European energy industry, particularly in the context of its decarbonisation, diversification, and modernisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global competition and climate change are changing the nature of economic activity and impose the urgent need to have environmentally sensitive productivity growth. The paper addresses both desirable and undesirable output to assess technical efficiency and productivity changes, as well as evaluate the importance of an energy input in the production function and productivity change differentials in the European Union (EU) over the period 2000–2018. To that end, it uses output-oriented data envelopment analysis and Malmquist productivity analysis. The results reveal that the EU is facing significant challenges due to a decreasing trend in technical efficiency and slow productivity growth. The absence of major improvements in human resource performance has reduced the benefits of technological innovations which are the main source of productivity growth. Additionally, the results show that energy use did not critically influence efficiency and productivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper explores the impact of early stage and established entrepreneurs on industrial energy consumption across European countries for the period 2001–2017. It proposes that industrial energy consumption is a complex multifaceted result of value-added activities conducted by different types of entrepreneurs and the quality of macroeconomic and entrepreneurial framework conditions, which support or hinder entrepreneurial activity and consequently energy use. After selecting the most appropriate model using a panel Bayesian averaging model approach, a fixed effects panel regression analysis was conducted to investigate more deeply the impact of different types of entrepreneurs on industrial energy consumption. The results show that early stage and established entrepreneurs exhibit different behavioral patterns with respect to energy use. The former follows, although statistically insignificantly, a U-shaped energy use curve. By contrast, the latter follows statistically significantly an inverted U-shaped curve. Additionally, the results confirm the important role of the governments and other policy authorities in creating favorable framework conditions, which can support the changes in behavioral energy practices and the development of new or established businesses aiming for sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To achieve the energy targets, energy policy of the European Union (EU) is trying to discourage residential electricity consumption employing different measures but without worsening the quality of life and jeopardizing its economic growth and development at the same time. This paper aims to directly and indirectly explore the effects of energy taxes on household electricity consumption and test the validity of the household electricity environmental Kuznets curve (EEKC) in a multivariate setting and a system generalized method of moments framework for EU member countries in the period 2005–2016. The results reveal that energy taxes influence electricity consumption more efficiently through energy prices than directly and in the long-run. Efficiency of energy taxes can be reinforced by combining changes in energy prices and policy measures that change the electricity consumption behavior patterns. As for the EEKC, the paper corroborates its inverted U-shaped form, assuming thereby at least the same level of policy efforts directed to accomplish the energy targets and household willingness to use goods in an environmentally friendly way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]