Decomposition and decoupling analysis of energy-related carbon emissions in Turkey

This study focuses on CO2 emission trends and its decompositions as well as decoupling performance between CO2 emissions and economic growth of Turkish case for the period of 1990–2016. The drivers of CO2 emission changes are calculated by using an extended Kaya identity and the well-established logarithmic mean Divisia index (LMDI) method. Decomposition results indicate that economic growth and population effects are the main driving forces in increases in carbon emissions in Turkey throughout the whole period, while other technology-based driving factors’ impacts have been rather minimal in reducing the emissions. Decoupling analysis results demonstrate that there is either no decoupling or weak decoupling in most of the years. Moreover, total decoupling effort index suggests that Turkey’s performance has been worsened in recent years as we found no decoupling between CO2 emissions and economic growth over the period of 2013–2016. The overall findings suggest that Turkish economic growth is unsustainable both environmentally and economically. Based on these findings, some policy implications and recommendations are discussed for the possible emission reductions.