Panel Granger causality between oil consumption and GDP: evidence from BRICS countries

This paper examines the causal relationship between oil consumption and economic growth in the BRICS countries for the period from 1985 to 2011. We employ a panel causality approach which accounts for both cross-sectional dependency and heterogeneity across countries. The empirical results support the view that oil consumption and economic growth are not sensitive to each other for the panel of BRICS countries. Looking at the individual country results, there is only some evidence for China of a bidirectional causality. The lack of sensitivity between oil consumption and GDP for the BRICS countries indicates that policies aiming at reducing the use of crude oil will have minor to no effect on the economic growth and development of the BRICS countries.http://www.inderscience.com/jhome.php?jcode=IJSEhb2016Economic

Causal relationship between nuclear energy consumption and economic growth in G6 countries: Evidence from panel Granger causality tests

Looking at the recent nuclear accident in Fukushima, Japan, the consequences were not just environmental or economic. The accident was a big hit to the reputation and trust in nuclear power generation making a number of countries reconsider the nuclear energy as an option. The recent financial crisis might have limited even more the developed countries from the necessary capital to invest in expensive power options but this might change in the future if the positive environmental effects of the nuclear power can be proven substantial. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the causal link between nuclear energy consumption and economic growth for six developed countries over the period from 1971 to 2011. Granger causality procedure based on Meta-analysis in heterogeneous mixed panels is used to allow for cross-sectional dependency and heterogeneity across countries. The empirical findings for the overall panel support the presence of unidirectional causality running from economic growth to nuclear energy consumption across the G-6 countries. However, in the case of UK we find a bidirectional causality running from nuclear energy consumption to economic growth; while the results for Germany confirm the growth hypothesis and for the rest of the countries the neutrality hypothesis.http://www.elsevier.com/locate/pnucenehb201