Study on the spatial correlation effects and influencing factors of carbon emissions from the electricity industry: a fresh evidence from China.

Abstract

Carbon emissions from the electricity industry (CEEI) account for a large proportion of China's total carbon emissions, and it is important to study the spatial correlation between CEEI and the influencing factors to promote cross-regional synergistic emission reduction and low-carbon development of the power system. In this paper, the quasi-input-output (QIO) model is applied to assess the transfer of carbon emissions generated by electricity trading based on the consideration of electricity carbon transfer, and the exploratory spatial data analysis (ESDA) method is applied to analyze the spatial correlation effect of carbon emissions from China's electric power sector from 2001 to 2020, analyzes its distribution pattern in both spatial and temporal dimensions, and applies the improved logarithmic mean Divisia index (LMDI) two-stage decomposition model to decompose the changes in CEEI into 11 influencing factors from the perspective of the whole industrial chain of power production, transmission, trade, and consumption. The research results show that (1) the spatial distribution of CEEI has obvious unevenness and aggregation characteristics, with high-high aggregation areas and hot spot aggregation areas generally concentrated in the North China Power Grid and the East China Power Grid, but the aggregation trend is gradually decreasing, while low-low aggregation areas and cold spot aggregation areas are concentrated in the Northwest China Power Grid and the Central China Power Grid, but the area is very limited. (2) The direction of carbon emission diffusion in China's electricity industry is gradually transitioning from southwest-northeast to northwest-southeast, and the east-west diffusion trend is stronger than the north-south diffusion trend and carbon emissions are gradually shifting to the northwest grid. (3) The total amount of electricity production is the most influential factor in the change of CEEI, driving the cumulative growth of CEEI by 4495.34 Mt, followed by GDP per capita and electricity consumption intensity. Coal consumption for power generation, the share of thermal power, and net electricity exports were the main factors inhibiting the increase in carbon emissions from the power sector, with cumulative contributions of -797.74 Mt, -619.99 Mt, and -47.76 Mt, respectively.