• CO2 emission intensity
• CO2 emission per capita
• financial crises
• GDP per capita
• local projections.
• pandemics
• wars

Global shocks, such as pandemics and wars, have an inevitable impact on the
economic and environmental indicators. Consequently, the COVID-19 pandemic
has raised many questions about its cross-country effect on the shape
of economic recovery and its environmental sustainability. This research studies
the short and long-term response of GDP per capita, CO2 emission per capita,
and CO2 emission intensity to pandemics and other major global shocks such as
wars and financial crises by utilizing the local projection approach. This study
shows that for most analyzed countries, the end of a pandemic positively
impacts both output and emissions in the short run, with the latter responding
sharper than the former. However, a reverse response to pandemics in a few
countries like the USA and Canada is observable, which contrasts with the
evidence emerging within Europe. also, we found that the end
of war produces a similar impact as a pandemic on emission intensity, while
for financial crises the evidence is mixed. The positive response of emission
indicators to the end of a pandemic eventually leads us to conclude that the
recovery from the current pandemic is likely to be brown for Europe, unless
policy packages that are different from historical post-crisis interventions are
undertaken. The European Green Deal appears promising in this respect