Peak CO2 Emissions Research Articles

The consequence of energy policies in China: A case study of the iron and steel sector

As a key energy-intensive sector, the iron and steel sector play an important role of achieving China's national energy efficiency target. This paper reviewed China's energy management system and industrial energy saving policies. Since the 11th Five Year Plan (FYP), China have set explicit energy saving targets for major industrial enterprises by target responsibility system (TRS), while “the Top-1000 program” during the 11th FYP and “the Top-10,000 enterprises project” during the 12th FYP are the most important actions saving energy in industry sectors. Industrial enterprises mainly implement energy saving policies by closing outdated facilities, applying advanced energy efficiency technologies and improving product structure.This paper also evaluates the energy saving performance of the iron and steel sector from 2006 to 2011 with 2005 as reference year. During this period, the iron and steel sector saved energy of 195.1 million tce based on the “value-added method”, and 167.1 million tce based on the “production output method”. The gap between the two methods comes from the contributor of production structure improvement, which resulted in the change of value-added per unit production output. Closing outdated facilities and applying advanced technology contribute 33% and 67% of the energy saving based on production output, which reflects the change of energy efficiency technologies.China has approved the new target of “achieving the peak of CO2 emissions around 2030”, as a response, future energy policy should be transformed from “energy saving amount” into “total amount control”. Increasingly economic-market policy tools should be encouraged, and energy efficiency and produce quality should be continually improved. In addition, in the 11th and 12th FYP, energy policies are mainly implemented in large-scaled enterprises, however, in the future they should be given sufficient attention to middle and small sized enterprises (SMEs).

CO2 emissions of China's food industry: an input–output approach

In a joint U.S.–China statement on climate change, the Chinese government declared to peak CO2 emissions around 2030. This demonstrates the government's determination to deal with carbon emission and climate change. Although the food industry is not a carbon emission-intensive industry, its large scale makes the emission reduction in the industry very important. Based on the input–output structural decomposition method, this paper calculates the CO2 emissions of China's food industry from 1991 to 2012, and decomposes the change in CO2 emissions of the industry during 1992–1997, 1997–2002, 2002–2007 and 2007–2010 into four main effects: emission factor, energy structure, energy intensity, and total output (including four sub-effects: intermediate use, domestic final demand, import substitution and export extension). The results show that changes in CO2 emissions in the food industry mainly depends on total output effect and energy intensity effect. Energy intensity effect is the most important factor reducing CO2 emissions, as it reduced cumulative 213 million tons (Mt) CO2 emissions of the industry. Among total output effect, the effects of intermediate use and domestic final demand are the two biggest contributors to carbon emissions. Finally, we provide some policy advices for constraining and reducing CO2 emissions of China's food industry. The advices include increasing R&D investment and the substitution of energy with other input factors to decrease energy intensity, increasing the added value of the food industry, optimizing the energy structure with more clean and low-carbon energy, and maintaining the prices of raw materials of the food industry (i.e. agricultural products) with taxes or subsidies.

An analysis of China's CO2 emission peaking target and pathways

China has set the goal for its CO2 emissions to peak around 2030, which is not only a strategic decision coordinating domestic sustainable development and global climate change mitigation but also an overarching target and a key point of action for China's resource conservation, environmental protection, shift in economic development patterns, and CO2 emission reduction to avoid climate change. The development stage where China maps out the CO2 emission peak target is earlier than that of the developed countries. It is a necessity that the non-fossil energy supplies be able to meet all the increased energy demand for achieving CO2 emission peaking. Given that China's potential GDP annual increasing rate will be more than 4%, and China's total energy demand will continue to increase by approximately 1.0%–1.5% annually around 2030, new and renewable energies will need to increase by 6%–8% annually to meet the desired CO2 emission peak. The share of new and renewable energies in China's total primary energy supply will be approximately 20% by 2030. At that time, the energy consumption elasticity will decrease to around 0.3, and the annual decrease in the rate of CO2 intensity will also be higher than 4% to ensure the sustained growth of GDP. To achieve the CO2 emission peaking target and substantially promote the low-carbon development transformation, China needs to actively promote an energy production and consumption revolution, the innovation of advanced energy technologies, the reform of the energy regulatory system and pricing mechanism, and especially the construction of a national carbon emission cap and trade system.

Linearity between temperature peak and bioenergy CO2 emission rates

The characteristics of the global mean temperature response to bioenergy production systems is explored under different assumptions and emissions scenarios in the context of the 2 °C target.

Analysis of CO2emissions peak: China’s objective and strategy

Establishing positive and urgent targets for CO2 reduction and emission peak, and promoting energy conservation and energy structure adjustment are among the strategies to address global climate change and CO2 emissions reduction. They are also means to break through the constraints of domestic resources and environment, and internal needs, to achieve sustainable development. Generally speaking, a country's CO2 emission peak appears after achieving urbanization and industrialization. By then, connotative economic growth will appear, GDP will grow slowly, energy consumption elasticity will decrease, and energy consumption growth will slow down – dependent mainly on new and renewable energies. Fossil fuel consumption will not increase further. When CO2 emission reaches its peak, the annual reduction rate of CO2 intensity of GDP is greater than GDP annual growth rate; and the annual reduction rate of CO2 intensity of energy use is greater than the annual growth rate of energy consumption. Therefore, three important approaches to promotion of CO2 emission peak can be concluded: maintaining reasonable control of GDP growth, strengthening energy conservation to significantly reduce the GDP energy intensity, and optimizing the energy mix to reduce the CO2 intensity of energy use. By around 2030, China will basically have completed its rapid development phase of industrialization and urbanization. Connotative economic growth will appear with the acceleration of industrial structure adjustment. The target of GDP energy intensity will still be to maintain an average annual reduction of 3% or higher. The proportion of non-fossil fuels will reach 20–25%, and the aim will be to maintain an average annual growth rate of 6–8%. The total annual energy demand growth of 1.5% will be satisfied by the newly increased supply of non-fossil fuels. The annual decline in CO2 intensity of GDP will reach 4.5% or higher, which is compatible with an average annual GDP growth rate of approximately 4.5% in order to reach CO2 emission peak. This corresponds to the level of China's potential economic growth. Achieving CO2 emission peak will not impose a rigid constraint on economic development, but rather promote economic development and accelerate the transformation of green, low-carbon development. The CO2 emission peak can be controlled with a cap of 11 billion tons, which means that CO2 emission will increase by less than 50% compared with 2010. The per capita emission peak will be controlled at a level of less than 8 tons, which is lower than the 9.5 tons in the EU and Japan and much lower than the 20 tons in the US, future economic and social development faces many uncertainties in achieving the CO2 emission peak discussed above. It depends on current and future strategies and policies, as well as the pace and strength of economic transformation, innovation, and new energy technologies. If the economic transformation pattern fails to meet expectations, the time required to reach CO2 emission peak would be delayed and the peak level would be higher than expected. Therefore, we need to coordinate thoughts and ideas and deploy these in advance; to highlight the strategic position of low-carbon development and its priorities; to enact mid- to long-term energy development strategies; and to establish and improve a system of laws, regulations, and policies as well as an implementation mechanism for green, low-carbon development. Oriented by positive and urgent CO2 reduction and peak targets, the government would form a reversed mechanism to promote economic transformation and embark on the path of green, low-carbon development as soon as possible.

Peak energy consumption and CO2 emissions in China

China is in the processes of rapid industrialization and urbanization. Based on the Kaya identity, this paper proposes an analytical framework for various energy scenarios that explicitly simulates China׳s economic development, with a prospective consideration on the impacts of urbanization and income distribution. With the framework, China׳s 2050 energy consumption and associated CO2 reduction scenarios are constructed. Main findings are: (1) energy consumption will peak at 5200–5400 million tons coal equivalent (Mtce) in 2035–2040; (2) CO2 emissions will peak at 9200–9400milliontons (Mt) in 2030–2035, whilst it can be potentially reduced by 200–300Mt; (3) China׳s per capita energy consumption and per capita CO2 emission are projected to peak at 4tce and 6.8t respectively in 2020–2030, soon after China steps into the high income group.

Uncertainties in climate stabilization

The atmospheric composition, temperature and sea level implications out to 2300 of new reference and cost-optimized stabilization emissions scenarios produced using three different Integrated Assessment (IA) models are described and assessed. Stabilization is defined in terms of radiative forcing targets for the sum of gases potentially controlled under the Kyoto Protocol. For the most stringent stabilization case (“Level 1” with CO2 concentration stabilizing at about 450 ppm), peak CO2 emissions occur close to today, implying (in the absence of a substantial CO2 concentration overshoot) a need for immediate CO2 emissions abatement if we wish to stabilize at this level. In the extended reference case, CO2 stabilizes at about 1,000 ppm in 2200—but even to achieve this target requires large and rapid CO2 emissions reductions over the twenty-second century. Future temperature changes for the Level 1 stabilization case differ noticeably between the IA models even when a common set of climate model parameters is used (largely a result of different assumptions for non-Kyoto gases). For the Level 1 stabilization case, there is a probability of approximately 50% that warming from pre-industrial times will be less than (or more than) 2°C. For one of the IA models, warming in the Level 1 case is actually greater out to 2040 than in the reference case due to the effect of decreasing SO2 emissions that occur as a side effect of the policy-driven reduction in CO2 emissions. This effect is less noticeable for the other stabilization cases, but still leads to policies having virtually no effect on global-mean temperatures out to around 2060. Sea level rise uncertainties are very large. For example, for the Level 1 stabilization case, increases range from 8 to 120 cm for changes over 2000 to 2300.

A dynamic upper atmosphere of Venus as revealed by VIRTIS on Venus Express

The upper atmosphere of a planet is a transition region in which energy is transferred between the deeper atmosphere and outer space. Molecular emissions from the upper atmosphere (90-120 km altitude) of Venus can be used to investigate the energetics and to trace the circulation of this hitherto little-studied region. Previous spacecraft and ground-based observations of infrared emission from CO2, O2 and NO have established that photochemical and dynamic activity controls the structure of the upper atmosphere of Venus. These data, however, have left unresolved the precise altitude of the emission owing to a lack of data and of an adequate observing geometry. Here we report measurements of day-side CO2 non-local thermodynamic equilibrium emission at 4.3 microm, extending from 90 to 120 km altitude, and of night-side O2 emission extending from 95 to 100 km. The CO2 emission peak occurs at approximately 115 km and varies with solar zenith angle over a range of approximately 10 km. This confirms previous modelling, and permits the beginning of a systematic study of the variability of the emission. The O2 peak emission happens at 96 km +/- 1 km, which is consistent with three-body recombination of oxygen atoms transported from the day side by a global thermospheric sub-solar to anti-solar circulation, as previously predicted.

Impacts of full cost pricing on the sustainability of urban transportation: towards Canada's Kyoto commitments

Certain concerns about sustainable transportation derive from the premise that significant atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases which contribute to global warming can be attributed to automotive emissions. Among measures considered to curtail automobile dependency and increase transit modal split, "full cost pricing" → a means of extracting both environmental costs and hidden subsidies which road users allegedly impose on society → has emerged as an increasingly popular suggestion. This paper examines the potential impact of full cost pricing on the "sustainability" of urban transportation, using Toronto as a case study. The analysis deals with the direct effects on mode choice and vehicle utilization resulting from increased user costs as might be achieved through fuel taxes or road pricing, as well as the indirect, longer term effects on location decisions. To investigate the land-use impacts, population distributions were altered to reflect more compact development and less urban sprawl as a proxy for relocations that might result from an increase in the costs of automobile use. Impacts are presented in terms of changes in total peak period vehicle-kilometres, mode split, and CO2 emissions. Despite several qualifications related to modelling techniques used in the case study, the analysis suggests that, overall, the impacts of large increases in road user costs appear to be less than proponents of full cost pricing would expect. In addition, the analysis suggests the fairly obvious, namely, that the greatest impacts of pricing occur within those choice markets where reasonable alternatives to the private automobile actually exist.Key words: sustainable transportation, road pricing, full cost pricing, urban transportation, emissions.