Energy consumption in China's ICT sectors: From the embodied energy perspective

Abstract

Understanding the energy consumption associated with information and communication technology (ICT) is essential for the sustainable development of a digital economy. Previous studies have mainly focused on the impact of ICT on direct energy consumption, and few have studied the embodied energy of ICT sectors. This paper develops an embodied energy analysis framework by integrating the input-output model and structural path analysis to examine the embodied energy of China's ICT sectors. It not only identifies key consumer sectors, final demand and primary sources, but also tracks critical supply chain paths. The results show that the embodied energy of ICT sectors in 2018 was 216.22 million tons of standard coal equivalent, which is nearly three times as much as their direct energy. Communication Equipment was the largest consumer with a share of 30.2%. Export, fixed capital formation and urban consumption were the main final demand, accounting for 57.1%, 25.4% and 12.8%, respectively. It is worth noting that 75.1% of ICT sectors' embodied energy indirectly originated from non-ICT sectors such as Smelting of Metals. This finding indicates that ICT sectors indirectly consume more energy from their upstream sectors, which can explain why the embodied energy of ICT sectors is much greater than their direct energy. In addition, critical supply chain paths that transfer more embodied energy, such as “Smelting of Metals→Electronic Components→Export”, are extracted. Finally, some suggestions are proposed from production, consumption and path-based perspectives, which can provide new insights into the sustainable development of ICT sectors and the digital economy.