Search

In recent years, energy efficiency has been considered an extremely cost-effective way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. China is a country with the world’s largest coal consumption and heavy reliance on thermal power generation. Therefore, the relationship between the coal consumption constraint policy (CCCP) in China and electrical energy efficiency is a topic worthy of study. Based on the panel data of 30 provinces in China during 2005–2016, this paper employs the difference-in-differences (DID) to examine the impact of CCCP on electrical energy efficiency in China. The results indicate that the implementation of the CCCP reduces electrical energy efficiency in the pilot provinces. Based on the mechanism tests, the cost effect outweighs the innovation effect, which is why CCCP decreases electrical energy efficiency. The results of the heterogeneity analysis show that the influence of CCCP is more significant in the provinces with weak law enforcement and small hydropower investment and northern provinces. This study suggests that the Chinese government can promote corporate technological innovation by improving the environmental compensation system and increasing environmental law enforcement to improve electrical energy efficiency. Meanwhile, renewable energy projects should be the focus of future investment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The global building sector, responsible for over 30% of CO2 emissions, necessitates urgent decarbonization efforts. This paper examines residential building decarbonization policies in three major economies—the European Union (EU), China, and India. It provides an overview of diverse policies through policy landscape analysis and delves into the design specifics with a detailed policy intensity analysis of building energy codes, information disclosure, and financial incentives in each region. Our findings reveal a diverse mix of policies targeting residential building decarbonization in all three regions. While the EU and China have long-established diverse policy instruments, India's building energy efficiency policies are relatively recent and limited. Detailed analyses of building energy codes, information disclosure, and financial incentives expose variations in ambition, scope, and implementation, even with shared policy instruments. Significant advancements in building energy codes, particularly in stringency and compliance checks, are evident in the EU and China. Conversely, India faces a notable obstacle with limited adoption of residential building energy codes, impacting its journey towards net-zero. The EU leads in building energy labelling policies, while China and India encounter various challenges hindering widespread implementation. Financial incentives across the three regions predominantly take the form of subsidies, potentially straining public budgets. The study concludes with reflections on the pressing need for future research extending beyond the operational phase of buildings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the initiatives of the United Nations Framework Convention for Climate Change (UNFCCC) and especially since the Paris Agreement of 2015, corporate environmental performance has become a critical component of corporate financial performance. Particularly, stakeholder pressure has driven environmental and financial inclusion targeted at raising corporate performance. Hence, this paper examines the link between corporations’ environmental performance (CEP) and corporations’ financial performance (CFP) using annual panel data from 130 corporations from China and 166 corporations annually over the years from 2010 to 2018. The empirical results from the FMOLS and ARDL tests show that corporations’ good emission preventive practices translate into improved financial performance in Japan but not in China, which is a reflection of the advanced earlier development of environmental governance in the former and the latecomer status of the latter. Nevertheless, environmental disclosure raises corporate financial performance in both China and Japan in the long run but CSR strategy is negatively correlated with corporate financial performance. Also, while the Dumitrescu Hurlin causality test shows that there is significant bidirectional causality between CEP and CFP in the Japan sample, this relationship is weak in the China sample. While the results confirm actions by Japan and China to strengthen corporate environmental governance, the initiatives in China should be quickened to enhance the relationship between CEP and CFP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the government implemented the supply-side structural reform, the growth of electricity consumption in energy-intensive manufacturing industries has been contained in an all-round way, which poses greater challenges to overcapacity in the power sector. It is still a mystery that how to restrain the electricity consumption of energy-intensive manufacturing industry affects the installed capacity of power generation. Thereupon, this paper empirically studies the relationship between electricity consumption of the six energy-intensive manufacturing subsectors and provincial power generation capacity. The empirical results with line loss rate as instrumental variables indicate that the electricity consumption of the six energy-intensive manufacturing subsectors will increase or decrease the installed capacity of power generation by a one-to-one elastic coefficient. In terms of manufacturing subsectors, the power sector's own electricity consumption has the highest capacity enhancement effect, followed by non-metallic minerals and chemical raw materials manufacturing subsectors. The resolution of overcapacity for power generation is fundamentally to reduce the electricity consumption intensity of the six high-energy-consuming manufacturing subsectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effectiveness of environmental regulations (ERs) has been examined carefully in the past time; however, the inputs of ERs have been neglected so far. In order to track the relationship between inputs and outputs of ERs, this paper first constructs an environmental regulatory efficiency (ERE) index system and develops an entropic slack-based model suitable for measuring China's ERE during 2004–2014, which considers the entropic allocation of multiple inputs and desirable and undesirable outputs. The influencing factors of ERE were then explored by the panel Tobit model. Results have illustrated that in China, ERE is relatively low in general, with significant and narrowing geographical discrepancies, and ERs are becoming more and efficient from 2004 to 2014. From the regional view, the east has the highest ERE values, followed by the west, then northeast, and lastly the central regions with the lowest values. Furthermore, it has been discovered that the economic development level and population density both affected ERE positively, while technological innovation and industrialization level exerted a reverse effect. From the perspectives of the level of opening-up and urbanization, environmental pursuits, all three displayed no correlation with ERE. The conclusions may be helpful for the Chinese government to improve ERE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Little attention has been paid to the influence of telecommunications on energy consumption, especially from an empirical perspective in the emerging economies. This paper firstly employs an autoregressive distribution lag bound test to examine the co-integration relationship among our model variables. Then, it mainly follows a partial least squares regression to investigate the long-run effect and an error correction model to explore the short-run impact of telecommunication services on energy intensity in China. Our main conclusions reveal a co-integration relationship among all the variables in our expanded STIRPAT model. Besides, it is also indicated that the energy intensity reduction effect of telecommunication services is statistically significant both in the short and long term. Additionally, the impacts of population, income, industrial structure, energy consumption structure, and energy price on energy intensity are also examined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy efficiency (EE) is an important strategy for China to save energy and reduce energy-related emissions. With significant regional diversities in China, it is important to conduct the EE assessment at the regional level. Usually, the regional EE assessment is applied to 30 regions in Mainland China using the data envelopment analysis (DEA) technique. With the "Belt and Road" strategy initiated by the Chinese government, it is reasonable and necessary to take Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan into consideration. However, such data expansion for China's regional EE assessment using DEA can reverse the relative rankings of some decision-making units, which is called the "rank reversal" phenomenon. In this paper, we illustrate in theory that rank reversal occurs in general DEA models, and apply the most popular five DEA models to assess China's regional energy efficiency from 2000 to 2014. The empirical study shows that the 30 regions in Mainland China have the least rank reversal when Tone's slack-based model (SBMT) is adopted. The main cause of ranking reversal is the addition of decision-making units lying on production frontier. Better understanding of the rank reversal phenomenon is critical for the energy efficiency assessment using DEA to inform the policy makings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

More and more literature are investigating the energy efficiency performance at provincial level. However, there are many problems in provincial energy balances in the officially released yearbooks, such as inconsistencies of statistical scope, the large gap between national data and sum of provincial data, and nontransparent data revision. Using yearbook data directly may result in errors and even some contradictory-to-actuality conclusions. Given this, based on the national economic census, this paper systematically revises and adjusts the 1995–2014 energy balances at province level. A four-dimension (province, year, sector, and energy type) energy dataset is constructed, which supports the structural energy efficiency research at provincial level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's 11th Five-Year Plan (FYP) sets an ambitious target to reduce the energy intensity per unit of gross domestic product by 20% from 2005 to 2010 (NDRC ). In the building sector, the primary energy-saving target allocated during the 11 FYP period is 100 Mtce. Savings are expected to be achieved through the strengthening of enforcement of building energy efficiency codes, existing building retrofits and heat supply system reform, followed by energy management of government office buildings and large-scale public buildings, adoption of renewable energy sources. To date, China has reported that it achieved the half of the 20% intensity reduction target by the end of 2008; however, little has been made clear on the status and the impact of the building programs. There has also been lack of description on methodology for calculating the savings and baseline definition, and no total savings that have been officially reported to date. This paper intends to provide both quantitative and qualitative assessment of the key policies and programs in building sector that China has instituted in its quest to fulfill the national goal. Overall, this paper concludes that the largest improvement for building energy efficiency were achieved in new buildings; the program to improve the energy management in government and large scale public buildings are in line with the target; however, the progress in the area of existing building retrofits, particularly heating supply system reform lags behind the stated goal by a large amount. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Industry is the largest electricity consuming sector in the world. China consumes about 25% of global electricity demand, and 69% of this is used in industries. The high electricity demand in industry is responsible for 45% of CO2, 25% of SO2, 34% of NOx and 14% of PM emissions in China. This study aims to fill the knowledge gap on the potential for electricity savings in China’s industries, thereby providing important implications for the potential of reducing emissions in electricity-intensive industrial subsectors in general. Available studies are reviewed and compared to identify electricity-saving potentials. The findings show that China’s industrial energy system is shifting to higher electricity and relatively lower fossil fuel use due to accelerated end-use electrification. China’s industry can reduce electricity use by 7–24% in 2040, compared to baseline levels, and generate emission reductions of 192–1118 Mt-CO2, 385–2241 kt-SO2, 406–2362 kt-NOx and 92–534 kt-PM2.5. The iron & steel subsector has the largest contribution to the industrial electricity savings, followed by non-ferrous metals, chemicals, cement and pulp & paper. Policies that combine environmental targets, demand-side efficiency and supply-side retrofits in the power sector should be adopted. Given the different performance of policies in terms of energy savings and emission reduction, sector- and region-specific policies would be preferred. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the development of economy, the impression of energy and environment is increasing, and improving energy efficiency plays a vital role in the sustainable economic development in China. An application of data envelopment analysis (DEA) and Malmquist indices has been used in this paper to investigate energy utilization efficiency of 30 provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities (apart from Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, and Tibet) in China. The results show that industries in the eastern area have the best average energy efficiency for the period 2006-2009, followed by the central area. The industrial energy overall technical efficiency, industrial energy pure technical efficiency, industrial energy scale efficiency, etc. in 30 different regions of China are examined. By the comparative analysis of energy efficiency, the results show that the energy efficiency of Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong, and Hainan provinces is effective, and the lowest six regions of energy efficiency are Ningxia, Inner Mongolia, Shaanxi, Liaoning, Chongqing, and Jilin, whose energy efficiency is in the level of 0.5 or so. The results mean that the eastern regions are better than the central and western regions according to energy efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is suggested in the proposal of the 11th Five Year Plan (from 2006 to 2010) that the total reduction rate of energy intensity per GDP (2005–2010) should be 20%. The annual reduction rate of energy intensity between 2005 and 2010 must reach 4.3% to meet this goal, and the elasticity of energy consumption should be less than 0.5. However, given that in 2000–2005 the average elasticity of energy consumption was as high as 1.084, it will be a great challenge to achieve the goal. We characterize the progress on energy efficiency in the context of the overall Chinese energy system, including both government policies and business efforts. When reviewing recent progress made (until 2007), major energy efficiency improvements can be observed. China is now adopting best efficiency practice in its newly installed capacity. This paper presents the policy packages and efficiency achievements in industry and other sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Considerable efforts have been made to estimate the relationship between energy and non-energy inputs in the production process. However, it remains controversial whether energy and non-energy inputs are complements or substitutes. Empirical analysis is conflicting on this issue. This study seeks to explore an alternative way to explain these conflicting results by examining the issue from the perspective of energy efficiency. This study is based on time series data for capital, labor, and energy from 28 Chinese provinces, covering 1985 to 2012. The results show that capital and energy are substitutes in all of the provinces, whereas labor and energy are complements in most of the provinces. Using the threshold effect model, we discover evidence of a threshold point based on the amount of energy efficiency activity in a province. This point separates the substitution behavior of provinces between energy and non-energy inputs. Low-energy efficiency provinces do not substitute as readily as high-energy efficiency provinces. The findings imply that the energy-saving technologies should be applied in provinces with comparatively higher energy intensity because they have more energy conservation potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purchasing energy-saving appliances is a sensible and practical way to reduce carbon emissions from the residential sector in China. This study examines the relationship between pro-environment behavioral intention—undergirded by environmental attitude and concern as well as perceived psychological benefits—and the choice to purchase energy-saving appliances among Chinese households. Integrating psychological benefits (i.e., warm glow and self-express benefits) into the theory of planned behavior, a first of its kind for China, we designed and implemented a cross-sectional online survey in 2016. We conducted Probit regression analyses based on the 942 effective responses collected. The results reveal that behavioral intention has significantly positive effects on the choice to purchase energy-saving appliances. Environmental attitude and concern, as well as psychological benefits, have a significantly positive impact on respondents' behavioral intention to buy energy-saving devices. Also, age and household size significantly and positively correlate with purchasing energy-saving appliance decision. These results point to useful policy implications to boost consumer support for energy-saving appliances in China and provide a foundation for similar research in other developing contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The exploration and modeling of the drivers of CO2 emissions can help make effective CO2 emission reduction policies. In this study, we examine the drivers of energy consumption-related CO2 emissions in China during 1978–2014 from a multiscale perspective. Firstly, we use the multivariate empirical mode decomposition model to simultaneously decompose the CO2 emissions and 17 drivers into several groups of intrinsic mode functions and one group of residues at different timescales. Secondly, we employ the stepwise regression analysis to explore and model the key drivers of CO2 emissions at different timescales without multicollinearity. The empirical results show that China's CO2 emissions have obvious timescales of 6.17 years, 9.25 years, 18.5 years, 37.0 years, and long-term trend. At the short-term timescales, fuel structure and economic structure have significant impacts on CO2 emissions. At the medium-term timescales, urban population and fuel structure are the major contributors to CO2 emissions. At the long-term timescale, only per capita GDP has a positive effect on CO2 emissions. Finally, we propose the policy implications at the short, medium, and long timescales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The energy efficiency of heating systems has become a critical concern for academic study and public welfare worldwide. Developing a comparable measurement tool among various residential space heating systems can offer policy-makers a benchmark for monitoring efficiency, guide them in setting appropriate energy conservation goals and promote overall efficiency improvements through heating system transitions. In the present study, we establish a framework to accommodate heterogenetic space heating systems and model the energy efficiency for performance assessment. By taking the heating area and heating hours into account, two energy intensity indicators are developed. Data from the Chinese Residential Energy Consumption Survey (CRECS) is used to examine the energy intensity for Northern and Southern residences. Our results show opposite findings from other studies, and the interpretation is presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The energy-related CO emissions in China have increased dramatically from 3384 to 8333 × 10 t during the last decade. To interpret these drastic changes, we undertake a structural decomposition analysis to decompose the changes in CO emissions from 1997 to 2010 into the following six driving forces: emission coefficient, energy intensity, Leontief, sectoral structure, demand allocation (the shares of consumption, investments, and exports in final demand), and final demand effects. The results show that declines in energy intensity had a decrease impact on CO emissions during the studied period. Changes in the relative importance of intermediate production in total output (the Leontief effect) contributed to decrease CO emissions in the 2000-2002 period and to increase emissions in the other periods. The most important driver behind the steady increase in CO emissions is the large increase in final demand. A further analysis at the sectoral level revealed differences and fluctuations between sectors. Energy intensity fell most strongly in the electric power sector and the coking, gas, and petroleum production sector (two energy-intensive sectors). The shift toward exports and investment increased CO emissions (demand allocation effect). Part of the increases in CO emissions thus stem from production activities for consumption activities elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]