Differences in Changes in Carbon Dioxide Emissions among China’s Transportation Subsectors: A Structural Decomposition Analysis

Abstract

ABSTRACT In recent years, one of the largest and most rapidly growing emitters of carbon dioxide (CO2) in China is the transportation industry. This article applies the structural decomposition analysis (SDA) method to identify the driving forces of CO2 emissions in four subsectors of the transportation industry in China and distinguishes the main final demand patterns that increase its emissions. Our results show that, first, during the study period, the expansion in demand was the largest contributor to the increase in CO2 emissions in the transportation industry, whereas the energy intensity effect played a dominant role in reducing emissions. In addition, CO2 emissions among four subsectors differed significantly not only in terms of changes in quantity but also the impacts of influencing factors. Moreover, most of the recent growth in CO2 emissions in China’s transportation industry has been driven by investment and exports. Because of the wide heterogeneity of changes in CO2 emissions among different transportation sectors, the particularities of each subsector should be taken into account in formulating pollution abatement policies in the transportation industry.