The Conditional Carbon Cost of Urbanisation: Energy Use, Emissions and Human Development in the Gulf Cooperation Council, 1990–2023

Cities deliver human development while generating the emissions that threaten it, a tension central to the 2030 Agenda. Using a balanced 1990–2023 panel of the six Gulf Cooperation Council states, we estimate a moderated STIRPAT model in which the carbon elasticity of urbanisation is conditioned on energy use per capita, alongside human‐development equations, using second‐generation methods. Energy use is the dominant emissions driver. The urbanisation–energy interaction is negative (−1.65, p < 0.01) and survives dynamic, carbon‐intensity, density and sub‐sample specifications: the elasticity falls from about +0.69 where energy use is low and vanishes in the most energy‐intensive systems. The conditional model outperforms the additive model in and out of sample. Urbanisation is strongly associated with human development, while emissions exposure is adversely associated with health; the composite‐index association rests on one country. Gulf decarbonisation depends less on slowing urbanisation than on reducing the energy intensity of urban form.