How to peak carbon emissions in China's power sector: A regional perspective

Abstract

China pledged to peak its carbon emissions by 2030. Considering the great contribution of power industry on the energy-related CO2 emissions and its main role for peaking China's CO2 emissions prior to 2030, this study aims to investigate the peaking time of CO2 emissions in China's power industry from a regional perspective. Only each regional power industry tries its best to peak its carbon emissions prior to 2030, will China's power industry achieve its carbon emissions peak by 2030. Consequently, we develop a National Energy Technology-Power (NET-Power) model to assess the impacts of technological improvement and energy structure shift on the carbon emissions for each region, and further answer the question of carbon emissions peak in the power industry. The results show that when taking joint actions of promoting advanced technologies and shifting to more renewable energy, China's power industry could peak its CO2 emissions at 3717.99MtCO2 in 2023. All regional power industries will achieve the goals of peaking their CO2 emissions by 2030 except East. The detailed development pathways of power-generation technologies for achieving the peak prior to 2030 in each region are drawn.