Fulfilling the Kyoto protocol in Spain: A matter of economic crisis or environmental policies?

In 2008, Spain exceeded by 20.9% the CO2 emissions allowed by the Kyoto Protocol for 2012. The financial and economic crisis has transformed these figures: as production fell so did energy demand and with it CO2 emissions. Will the Spanish economic crisis allow Spain to fulfill its commitments? With this in mind, we have developed an extended input–output model able to forecast energy demand and compute CO2 emissions linked to the consumption of energy goods: petroleum products, gas and coal. The results show that the crisis, and in particularly, the stagnation of the construction industry, is only one of the pillars which help to contain these emissions at −6.81%. The possibility of incorporating environmental policies, new technologies and increases in the price of crude oil in these simulations, means an even greater reduction of emissions than the impact of the crisis (−9.76%). The final result of our most pessimistic/realistic scenario is that, in 2012, Spain will exceed its CO2 emissions, linked to the combustion of energy goods, by only 0.9%.