Abstract
Abstract Tourism significantly impacts environmental performance through activities like transportation and accommodation, both of which contribute to carbon emissions. Geopolitical risks, such as the Russia-Ukraine conflict, further exacerbate these challenges by disrupting energy markets, increasing reliance on alternative energy sources, and driving higher fossil fuel emissions. This study examines the effects of tourism, energy consumption, economic growth, technological innovation, geopolitical risks, and economic policy uncertainty on carbon emissions in Canada by using annual time series data for the period 1990–2022. Employing the advanced Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model, this study finds that tourism, energy consumption, economic growth, geopolitical risks, and economic policy uncertainty significantly contribute to rising carbon emissions in the long run. In contrast, technological innovation enhances environmental sustainability by mitigating emissions. From the Toda-Yamamoto predictive causality test, it is revealed that energy consumption, economic growth, technology innovation, and economic policy uncertainty show a bidirectional causal link with carbon emissions, while tourism and geopolitical risks exhibit a unidirectional relationship. Based on the findings of this study, Canada should prioritize investment in green technology innovation and implement policies to mitigate the environmental impact of tourism and energy consumption.