International Journal of Business & Economic Studies, vol.3, no.1, pp.43-54, 2021 (Peer-Reviewed Journal)
Among the causes of environmental pollution, which has become a global problem, are the increase in consumption of fossil-based energy sources due to industrialization and technological development, population growth and urbanization. Countries use different methods of struggle at national and international level in solving environmental problems. The most effective way to be implemented within the scope of this struggle is environmental taxes. One of the taxes used to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is carbon taxes, which is a type of environmental tax. Most of the applications for these taxes in the world are seen in EU countries. Although carbon taxes have not been placed on a legal basis in Turkey, there are tax practices under the name of environmental taxes. In this context, the first tax applied directly within the scope of combating environmental pollution within the Turkish Tax System is the Environmental Cleaning Tax. The bag fee can also be evaluated within this scope. In this study, the effect of environmental taxes on CO2 emissions for the period of 1994-2015 in Turkey was examined. For this purpose, the long-term relationship between the series included in the analysis was investigated with the Johansen Cointegration test. Long-term coefficient estimates were made using FMOLS, DOLS and CCR Models. In the study, it was concluded that the series were co-integrated and that the environmental tax reduced CO2 emissions in the long run.