Provincial Carbon Emissions Reduction Allocation Plan in China Based on Consumption Perspective

Xuecheng Wang,Yang Lv,Xu Tang,Benjamin Mclellan,Baosheng Zhang

doi:10.3390/su10051342

Xuecheng Wang, Yang Lv + Show 3 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/su10051342

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Abstract

China is a country with substantial differences in economic development, energy consumption mix, resources, and technologies, as well as the development path at the provincial level. Therefore, China’s provinces have different potential and degrees of difficulty to carry out carbon emission reduction (CER) requirements. In addition, interprovincial trade, with a large amount of embodied carbon emissions, has become the fastest growing driver of China’s total carbon emissions. A reasonable CER allocation plan is, therefore, crucial for realizing the commitment that China announced in the Paris Agreement. How to determine a fair way to allocate provincial CER duties has become a significant challenge for both policy-makers and researchers. In this paper, ecological network analysis (ENA), combined with a multi-regional input-output model (MRIO), is adopted to build an ecological network of embodied emissions across 30 provinces. Then, by using flow analysis and utility analysis based on the ENA model, the specific relationships among different provinces were determined, and the amount of responsibility that a certain province should take quantified, with respect to the embodied carbon emission (ECE) flows from interprovincial trade. As a result, we suggest a new CER allocation plan, based on the detailed data of interprovincial relationships and ECE flows.

Highlights

One of the most essential discussions in 21st century is how the global community can work together to deal with the threat of climate change by keeping the global temperature rise within a reasonable range in this century [1]
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China is a country with substantial regional differences in economic development level, energy consumption structure, resources, and technologies, as well as their own development path, which means they have different potential and difficulties to carry out carbon emission reduction (CER) tasks

Summary

Introduction

One of the most essential discussions in 21st century is how the global community can work together to deal with the threat of climate change by keeping the global temperature rise within a reasonable range in this century [1]. As the world’s largest carbon emitter, accounting for nearly 29% of global emissions [3], has set a target of reaching its emissions peak before 2030, reducing its greenhouse emissions intensity of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by 60–65% over 2005 level by 2030 with respect to the Paris Agreement [4]. An unreasonable CER allocation plan will slow down China’s economic growth as a whole, but will become a crucial impediment for realizing the commitment that China announced in the Paris Agreement. According to Chen et al (2016), unsuitable CER allocation in China imposes increasing pressure on both Chinese central and local governments and could slow down the GDP growth in some provinces [9]. How to formulate a fair CER allocation plan at the provincial level, based on the different provinces’ characteristics, is a significant challenge for both policy-makers and researchers

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