LAUSR

Abstract The transportation sector is a key economic sector and an important source of CO2 emissions. Due to these environmental implications and a desire to reduce emission levels, the number of empirical analyses on the transportation sector have increased significantly in recent times. Given this pretext, our study examines the heterogeneity and spatial autocorrelation CO2 emissions of the transportation sector for 51 belt and road economies from 2000 to 2014. As part of analysis, we examine the heterogeneity of CO2 emissions in the transportation sector through the use of the Theil index and semi-variogram analysis. Furthermore, our study also analyzed the global and local spatial autocorrelation of transport sector CO2 emissions using the Moran index for participating countries. From the analysis, this study found that the transportation CO2 emission intensity of Central and Western Asia and North Africa is significantly higher than that of other regions along the belt and road, and there is a strong spatial correlation in Southeast Asian countries. Our research provides a key reference point for governments by proposing carbon-reduction policies and the promotion of greener developmental initiatives within the transportation sector.