CO2 Emission Efficiency Research Articles

Does Service Trade Globalization Promote Trade and Low-Carbon Globalization? Evidence from 30 Countries

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of service trade globalization on low-carbon globalization. Two newly developed non-radial directional distance functions of UEI (Unified Efficiency Index) and EEPI (Energy-Environmental Performance Index) were adopted to evaluate energy and CO2 emission performances of 30 countries during the period 1980–2013. A multiple regression analysis was conducted based on the Tobit model. Results showed that: (1) Service trade openness has a positive effect on energy and CO2 emission efficiency, and the effect has been intensified with time. (2) Emerging service sectors promoted the improvement of energy and CO2 emission efficiency, while the traditional sectors hindered the efficiency improvement. (3) There existed a “catch-up” effect between less developed countries and developed countries on energy and CO2 emission efficiency. Policy implications are thus drawn on how to promote the improvement of energy and carbon emission efficiency in the context of low-carbon globalization.

Impact of FDI and R&D on China's industrial CO2 emissions reduction and trend prediction

In this paper, we investigated the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) and research as well as development (R&D) on industrial carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions reduction. Firstly, a Panel-Corrected Standard Error (PCSE) model was established based on Chinese provincial panel data during period of 2000–2017. Secondly, a Grey Model (GM) was constructed to predict the growth trend of CO2 emissions, FDI and R&D in China from 2018 to 2030. It was deduced that: (1) FDI do bring negative effects on industrial CO2 emissions at the national level. From the perspective of regions, the coefficients of the eastern, central and western regions are all negatively correlated with CO2 emissions and pass the test of 1% significance level except the northeastern China. (2) In terms of R&D, it showed significantly improvement on CO2 emissions at the national and regional levels. Moreover, the efficiency of industrial CO2 emissions was improved by R&D with a rate of 27.2%, while the related value was increased by FDI with a rate of merely 4.3% at the national level. (3) According to the results of GM (1,1), China is expected to achieve zero growth of CO2 emissions by 2030. The growth rate of FDI gradually decreased to less than 5%, while the R&D input will always be at an annual growth rate of more than 5% for a long period of time in the future.

Process development for integrated coal gasification solid oxide fuel cells hybrid power plants – Investigations on solid oxide fuel cells/gas turbine hybrid power plants run on clean coal gas

On the road to sustainable generation of electricity, the efficiency of fossil-fuel power plants and CO2 emissions must be increased and decreased respectively. Integrated coal gasification solid oxide fuel cell hybrid power plants have the potential to achieve high power plant efficiencies and enable opportunities for the efficient capture of CO2. The investigation of such power plants is the subject of this publication. The developed systems are based on conventional integrated coal gasification combined cycle technology and integrated with solid oxide fuel cells preceding the combined cycle process. The state of development of the selected solid oxide fuel cell technology is similar to that of integrated coal gasification combined cycles. Along with the base case, several other concepts with and without CO2 capture are developed using various process technologies. Fundamental system and sensitivity analyses are performed using simplified sub-processes to obtain general statements and trends as well as to calculate optimal boundary conditions for the overall systems. The simulations show that the preparation of process gas using a water gas shift reactor before entering the solid oxide fuel cells is beneficial for the overall efficiency. If a CO2 capture process is included, 11–16% lower net efficiencies are achieved. The level of specific CO2 emissions is significantly influenced by the net efficiency of the power plants and the portion of carbon bound as CO2 at the beginning of the CO2 capture process. Here, the combination of CO2 capture and water gas shift reactor upstream of the solid oxide fuel cells is the preferred concept regarding efficiency and CO2 emissions.

Results of simulation and experimental research of automobile gas diesel engine

The paper is dedicated to conversion of a truck diesel engine into a gas diesel engine. Different ways of diesel engine conversion for operation on natural gas were analyzed. The gas diesel working process with minimized portion of igniting diesel fuel supplied by the Common Rail system was selected as the most suitable for such an engine. Modular gas feed and electronic engine control systems were developed in MADI which may be mounted on high- and medium-speed gas diesel engines. The fuel supply system of the base diesel engine was preserved though a new algorithm of fuel injection for the gas diesel engine was developed. The systems were perfected using simulation by computer model developed in MADI and during engine tests. The gas diesel engine demonstrated good fuel efficiency and considerable decrease of NOx and CO2 emissions, though its power at low speed decreased compared to the base diesel engine. The ways to improve this drawback during the future work were proposed.

How do CO2 emissions and efficiencies vary in Chinese cities? Spatial variation and driving factors in 2007

Understanding the spatial variability of CO2 emissions among and within cities and its driving factors is a prerequisite for emission reductions. Using 10 × 10 km national grid emission data (circa 2007), we quantified the spatial distribution of total CO2 emissions and emission efficiency of Chinese cities at the prefectural city scale. The emission efficiency was measured according to the emission intensity, CO2 emissions per capita, residential CO2 emissions per capita and industrial CO2 emissions per unit area. We found substantial variability in the total CO2 emissions among cities ranging from <0.1 to 214.3 million tons. High total CO2 emissions were mostly concentrated in northern, eastern and northeastern China. An overall analysis of the total CO2 emissions and emission intensity revealed that 75% of the cities in northern China had higher total emissions and lower efficiencies than the national average, and these cities shall be the main targeted cities for CO2 emissions reduction and emission intensity improvement. Additionally, urban districts had higher total CO2 emissions and emissions per capita than their surrounding regions for the majority of the prefectural cities. Four indicators, including the industrial structure, gross domestic product (GDP), total population, and size of the built-up area, were significantly related to the CO2 emissions and emission efficiency. Industrial structure was the most important driving force. Our results underscore the need to design region- and/or city-specific reduction strategies instead of a one-size-fits-all policy, and provide strategic information to public and private decision makers on controlling total emissions and improving emission efficiency.

The influence of market reform on the CO2 emission efficiency of China

In recent years, the constant advancement of market reform in China improves the market allocation efficiency of production factors and further promotes the rapid growth of economic aggregate output in the country. Additionally, the CO2 emitted in China also constantly increases. Based on panel data pertaining to 30 provinces from 1998 to 2015 in China, the CO2 emission efficiency and marketisation level of China were separately measured using a super Slacks-based measure approach and generalised principal component analysis. On this basis, by utilising a dynamic panel regression model and a panel smooth transition regression model, the influence of market reform on CO2 emission efficiency was explored. The results show that the marketisation level exerts a significantly positive effect on CO2 emission efficiency in both models and the results are robust. On the condition of taking energy price as a threshold variable, the influence of process of marketisation is significantly greater than that when taking technological progress as a threshold variable. It implied that although energy price and technological progress both significantly promote the marginal effect of market reform on CO2 emission efficiency, the energy price shows a greater influence than technological progress. Infrastructure construction and urbanisation can inhibit the improvement of CO2 emission efficiency. Additionally, the proportion of secondary industries can delay the improvement of CO2 emission efficiency.

Decoupling Measurement of Regional CO2 Emissions Growth: A Case Study of Chongqing, China

It is essentially and urgently to decouple CO2 emissions growth from economic growth in the era of industrialization which has made seriously environmental pollution. But how to evaluate the state of CO2 emissions growth from the regional economic growth? The authors in this paper discover the linkage from coupling to decoupling between CO2emissions growth and regional economic growth by using Tapio model based on the case study of Chongqing Municipality of China. It indicates that the Chongqing Municipality’s state ofCO2 emissions growth from regional economic growth is very weak. During the years from 1997 to 2015, there was a trend of weak decoupling, strong decoupling, and negative of expansion between Chongqing's economic growth and its CO2 emission growth, that is, 58% of the years were in the elastic value scale of 0<r<0.8, which shows that the speed of Chongqing's economic growth is faster than that of its CO2 emissions growth, but the state of CO2 emissions growth from economic growth is still relatively low. In the future, the improvement of CO2 emissions efficiency through green and low-CO2 development is the main roadmap of increasing the state of CO2 emissions growth from economic growth in Chongqing Municipality.

Energy, CO2, and AQI Efficiency and Improvement of the Yangtze River Economic Belt

With the rapid development of its economy, environmental governance is becoming more important in China. The Yangtze River Economic Belt (YREB), as the world’s largest inland shipping channel, can lead the country’s regional green economy development. As most research on China’s environmental efficiency focuses on provinces or the east and west regions, this paper examines its energy input and output and environmental effects from the aspects of YREB and non-YREB, breaking through the limitations of previous studies that only used cross-section or panel data for environmental assessment. This paper employs the meta-frontier dynamic SBM model, selects fixed assets as carry-over indicators, and considers the interrelationships between the dynamics variables during 2014–2016. The results are as follows: The overall energy efficiency and CO2 emission efficiency of YREB are higher than those of non-YREB. The difference in energy consumption, CO2, and AQI efficiency is large, but the performance of YREB is generally better than that of non-YREB. After setting the meta-frontier, non-YREB is better than YREB, for the main reason that the technology gap values of YREB are smaller than those of non-YREB. Our findings thus suggest that YREB should strengthen technical exchanges and promotion within its region, thereby decreasing regional technology differences, while non-YREB should address environment protection and CO2 emissions and advocate a low-carbon production mode.

The decomposition of total-factor CO2 emission efficiency of 97 contracting countries in Paris Agreement

Greenhouse gas reduction requires joint efforts from the global society, while improving CO2 emission efficiency is a centrally important means to realize emission reduction targets. Therefore, it is of strategic importance to identify main influential factors to CO2 emission efficiency of different countries by considering the technology heterogeneity. The originality herein lies in that, applying the modified decomposition method of Metafrontier Malmquist Luenberger Index (MML) to define the priority of contracting countries in Paris Agreement to improve emission efficiency. In this study, 97 contracting countries of Paris Agreement are divided into 4 groups according to levels of income (low-income countries, lower-middle income countries, upper-middle income countries and high-income countries), and studied with their input and output data during 1990–2014 as samples. The empirical results reveal that the paths for the contracting countries of Paris Agreement to improve the efficiency are different: first, lower-middle income group can be facilitated through increasing factor input to increase the MML index considering the highest increase in scale efficiency (2.78%). Second, low-income group should eliminate the excessive concentration of inputs by enhancing the energy management efficiency. Third, in terms of the significant advancement of high-income group's MML index brought by technology advancement and the abnormal drop of Brunei Darussalam's MML related to technology decay, this analysis emphasized that the advancement and innovation of energy technology are the main force for total-factor CO2 emission efficiency improvement.

The efficient, the intensive, and the productive: Insights from urban Kaya scaling

Urban areas play an unprecedented role in potentially mitigating climate change and supporting sustainable development. In light of the rapid urbanisation in many parts on the globe, it is crucial to understand the relationship between settlement size and CO2 emission efficiency of cities. Recent literature on urban scaling properties of emissions as a function of population size has led to contradictory results and more importantly, lacked an in-depth investigation of the essential factors and causes explaining such scaling properties. Therefore, in analogy to the well-established Kaya Identity, we develop a relation combining the involved exponents. We demonstrate that application of this Urban Kaya Relation will enable a comprehensive understanding about the intrinsic factors determining emission efficiencies in large cities by applying it to a global dataset of 61 cities. Contrary to traditional urban scaling studies which use Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression, we show that the Reduced Major Axis (RMA) is necessary when complex relations among scaling exponents are to be investigated. RMA is given by the geometric mean of the two OLS slopes obtained by interchanging the dependent and independent variable. We discuss the potential of the Urban Kaya Relation in mainstreaming local actions for climate change mitigation.

Energy efficiency of agricultural systems in the southwest coastal zone of Bangladesh

Indicators for energy-use efficiency and levels of CO2 emissions were used to evaluate and compare a range of agricultural systems in coastal Bangladesh in order to identify the most energy efficient system. Using data collected by the authors, five different food production systems involving both agriculture and aquaculture in the coastal area of Bangladesh were studied. In particular, Bagda (shrimp), Bagda-rice, rice, Galda (prawn)-rice-vegetable, and traditional practice-based agricultural systems were thoroughly investigated. The findings revealed that the Galda (prawn)-rice-vegetable-based integrated agricultural system was the most energy-efficient system and released less CO2 than the other four systems.

Carbon emissions efficiency in China: Key facts from regional and industrial sector

Improving CO2 emissions efficiency has become a crucial task faced by China to develop a low-carbon economy and choose a CO2 emissions mitigation path. Existing researches have focused on estimating national CO2 emissions efficiency, but have ignored the industrial heterogeneity in the region or explanation for inefficiency. To fill the gaps, this paper applies a metafrontier-Malmquist index analysis method combined with a three-level common frontier model to comprehensively estimate and decompose the carbon emissions efficiency and dynamic changes of China's industries and regions during 2010–2015. First, we use data envelopment analysis with directional distance function by considering three-level frontiers to calculate CO2 emissions efficiency. Results show that China's overall CO2 emissions efficiency is at the middle level with an average value of 0.511. The efficiency of CO2 emissions in the eastern region is the highest, followed by the central and western regions, and the CO2 emissions efficiency in the tertiary industries is greater than that in the primary and secondary industries. Second, we decompose CO2 emissions efficiency into technological, industrial and management efficiency, and found that management efficiency is the main reason for low CO2 emissions efficiency in developed regions and industries. Third, the Malmquist-Luenberger index is utilized to decompose CO2 emissions efficiency into 9 items, and we obtained that continuous technological progress is the leading cause driving different degrees of improvement in CO2 emissions efficiency.

Carbon efficiency and carbon abatement costs of coal-fired power enterprises: A case of Shanghai, China

In this paper, we adopt a non-radial directional distance function to analyze the efficiency and shadow price of CO2 emissions of coal-fired power plants. Using a sample of Shanghai's 20 coal-fired power plants, we find that the efficiency performance of power plants remained steady during the period 2007–2010. On average, the carbon abatement costs of Shanghai's power plants increased from 20.58 yuan/ton to 39.67 yuan/ton during 2007–2010. Although the average shadow price of the power plants increased during the period, the price was still well below shadow prices for the energy consumption of the industries, and a little lower than the trading price in the ETS markets. In addition, the paper discusses the implications of the findings.

Estimating the impacts of urban form on CO2 emission efficiency in the Pearl River Delta, China

The improvement of CO2 emission efficiency is of great significance to realizing energy-saving and emission reduction targets and achieving low-carbon development. While it is increasingly recognized that urban form could significantly influence the CO2 emissions of urban areas, few studies have been able to quantify the implications of urban form in relation to CO2 emission efficiency. The purpose of this paper is thus to contribute to existing literature by empirically quantifying how urban form influences CO2 emission efficiency. CO2 emission efficiency in this study is presented in terms of CO2 economic efficiency (CEE) and CO2 social efficiency (CSE). Firstly, we calculated the CEE and CSE of nine cities in the Pearl River Delta (Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Foshan, Jiangmen, Zhaoqing, Huizhou, Dongguan, and Zhongshan) using locally important socioeconomic variables over the period 1990–2013. Then, seven landscape metrics were selected in order to quantify three dimensions of urban form (extension, irregularity, and compactness) using remote sensing data. Finally, panel data models were utilized to estimate the associations between urban form and CO2 emission efficiency. We identified a negative correlation between urban sprawl and CEE as well as CSE, a finding that indicates that urban growth decreases CO2 economic efficiency. Further, increasing irregularity in the form of cities was found to decrease both CEE and CSE—a larger degree of irregularity, in other words, results in lower CO2 emission efficiency. Conversely, urban compactness was identified as having a significant positive influence on both CEE and CSE, indicating that the compact development of cities can actually help to improve CO2 emission efficiency. The findings of this study hold important implications for building low-carbon cities in China.

Dose urban landscape pattern affect CO2 emission efficiency? Empirical evidence from megacities in China

In addition to socioeconomic factors, urban morphology is increasingly being recognized for the potential role it might play in tackling climate change. Meanwhile, improving CO2 emission efficiency has become a significant aim in reducing CO2 emissions without sacrificing economic development. Hence, investigating the effects of urban landscape pattern on CO2 emission efficiency is of great importance. As thus, this study is designed to quantitatively estimate the associations between urban landscape pattern and CO2 emission efficiency, using panel data for five megacities in China in the period 1990–2013. A series of landscape metrics were first selected to quantify three dimensions of urban landscape pattern, namely urban expansion, urban shape complexity, and urban compactness. CO2 emission efficiency was then evaluated using three quantitative indicators, namely per capita CO2 emission, CO2 emission intensity, and CO2 emission performance. Finally, panel data models were performed to estimate the influences of urban landscape pattern on CO2 emission efficiency. The results demonstrate that both urban expansion and urban shape complexity inhibited the improvement of CO2 emission performance. In addition, urban compactness was found to be conducive to the reduction of CO2 emission per capita and CO2 emission intensity, as well as the improvement of CO2 emission performance. The findings obtained through this study cast a new light on the significance of city planning and the optimization of spatial structure in improving CO2 emission efficiency, providing decision makers and urban planners with a scientific basis from which to approach the task of reducing CO2 emissions whilst maintaining economic development.

Measuring Industrial CO2 Emission Efficiency in the Yangtze River Delta, China: A Parametric Distance Function Approach

As one of the most developed regions in China, the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) is experiencing rapid industrialization and urbanization, which is accompanied by huge carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. To improve the competitiveness of YRD, Chinese government has redefined the scope of YRD, and proposed the concept of YRD urban agglomeration recently. It is therefore crucial to evaluate new-YRD’s sustainability by studying industrial CO2 emission efficiency (ICEE) at city level. To this end, we employ a parametric distance function approach to evaluate the ICEE of 26 cities in YRD and analyze its space-time evoluation during 2006-2015 based on the GIS visualization method. The findings indicate that ICEE varies greatly across the cities of the YRD and is found to present a spatial cluster.

Estimation of marginal abatement costs of CO2 in Chinese provinces under 2020 carbon emission rights allocation: 2005-2020.

The calculation of marginal abatement costs of CO2 plays a vital role in meeting China's 2020 emission reduction targets by providing reference for determining carbon tax and carbon trading pricing. However, most existing researches only used one method to discuss regional and industrial marginal abatement costs, and almost no studies predicted future marginal abatement costs from the perspective of CO2 emission efficiency. To make up for the gaps, this paper first estimates marginal abatement costs of CO2 in three major industries of 30 provinces in China from 2005 to 2015 based on three assumptions. Second, based on the principle of fairness and efficiency, China's 2020 emission reduction targets are decomposed by province. Based on the ZSG-C-DDF model, the marginal abatement costs of CO2 in all provinces in China in 2020 are estimated and compared with the marginal abatement costs of 2005 to 2015. The results show that (1) from 2005 to 2015, marginal abatement costs of CO2 in all provinces show a fluctuating upward trend; (2) compared with the marginal abatement costs of primary industry or tertiary industry, most provinces have lower marginal abatement costs for secondary industry; and (3) the average marginal abatement costs of CO2 for China in 2020 are 2766.882 Yuan/tonne for the 40% carbon intensity reduction target and 3334.836 Yuan/tonne for the 45% target, showing that the higher the emission reduction target, the higher the marginal abatement costs of CO2. (4) Overall, the average marginal abatement costs of CO2 in China by 2020 are higher than those in 2005-2015. The empirical analysis in this paper can provide multiple references for environmental policy makers.

Energy efficiency, carbon dioxide emission efficiency, and related abatement costs in regional China: a synthesis of input–output analysis and DEA

This paper attempts to examine energy efficiency, carbon dioxide (CO2) emission efficiency, and related abatement costs of China’s regions in 2012 by considering embodied carbon caused by trade. To this end, a combined approach with environmentally extended input–output analysis (EEIO) and DEA is proposed. We first apply the EEIO model to measure CO2 emissions of 30 China’s regions from the consumption perspective, which can identify the described embodied carbon. According to the amounts of CO2 emissions with respect to the production-based and consumption-based principles, 30 regions are divided into two groups, i.e., emission-importing regions and emission-exporting regions. For emission-importing regions, CO2 emissions from the consumption perspective exceed that from the production-based perspective. The emission-exporting regions exhibit the opposite case. Our results show that energy efficiency and CO2 emission abatement costs will be underestimated in both groups when ignoring the embodied carbon emissions. The emission-importing regions evidence higher efficiency scores and abatement costs than those emission-exporting regions, and there is a significant difference between these two groups in terms of energy efficiency and CO2 emission efficiency, whereas there is no significant difference with respect to CO2 emission abatement costs. It is interesting that emission-exporting regions enjoy a slight increase in CO2 emission efficiency whereas emission-importing regions suffer from a decrease. Some useful policy implications are achieved.

Energy efficiency and reduction of CO2 emissions from campsites management in a protected area

Campsites can be a pollution source, mainly due to the energy consumption. In addition, the green areas, thanks to the direct CO2 sequestration and the shading, indirectly prevent the CO2 emissions related to energy consumption.The methodology presented in this paper allowed assessing the annual CO2 emissions directly related to the campsite management and the consequent environmental impact in campsite clusters in Tuscany. The software i-Tree Canopy was exploited, enabling to evaluate in terms of “canopy” the tonnes of CO2 sequestered by the vegetation within each campsite. Energy and water consumptions from 2012 to 2015 were assessed for each campsite. As far as the distribution of sequestered CO2 is concerned, the campsites ranking was in accordance to their size. According to the indicator "T-Tree" or canopy cover, a larger area of the canopy cover allows using less outdoor areas covered by trees for the sequestration of the remaining amount of pollutants.The analysis shows that the considered campsites, that are located in a highly naturalistic Park, present significant positive aspects both in terms of CO2 emission reductions and of energy efficiency. However, significant margins of improvement are also possible and they were analysed in the paper.

Regional differences on CO2 emission efficiency in metallurgical industry of China

Analysis of CO2 emission has attracted more attention due to increasing environmental awareness. As a pillar of the national economy, the CO2 emissions of the metallurgical industry continually increased during 2000–2015 and reached around 3208.65 million tons in 2015. Thus, research on the CO2 emission performance of the metallurgical industry is significant for achieving binding emission reduction targets in China's 13th Five-Year Plan as well as constructing clean and low carbon energy system based on the directives of the 19th CPC National Congress. Taking regional heterogeneity into consideration, we construct a Metafrontier Malmquist CO2 Emissions Performance Index (MMCPI) to conducts a multi-dimensional analysis of the CO2 emissions performance in metallurgical industry of China, focusing on the CO2 emission efficiency, the main influencing factors of carbon performance and CO2 emission reduction potentials. Based on the aforementioned analysis, the paper finds that technological progress change was the main factor contributing to the improvement of the CO2 emissions efficiency of the metallurgical industry. Under the meta-frontier, Central and Western China still have a CO2 emissions reduction potential of 75.3% and 81.1% correspondingly. Under the group-frontier, the lowest reduction potential in Eastern, Central and Western China is in Jiangsu, Hubei and Chongqing respectively.