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Even before China's commitment to carbon neutrality and peak in September 2020, many programs had been implemented to save energy. One such program was the "Action Plan for Energy Conservation and Low-Carbon for Ten Thousand Enterprises" (hereafter Top-10,000 Enterprises Energy-Saving Program, or Top-10,000 Program, or Program) launched in 2011, which targets high energy users. The official assessment of this program, which began during China's 12th Five Year Plan period (2011–2015), claimed that it had achieved its goals. However, there has been no precise measurement of how much it has contributed to China's total energy conservation achievements and how enterprises responded to it. Employing the regression discontinuity design approach and Chinese taxation survey data, this study represents a pioneering attempt to assess the energy savings resulting from this program. Our study estimates that this program accounted for an average of 5.8% of nationwide energy savings. The primary methods employed by enterprises to save energy were enhancing energy efficiency and dynamically adjusting production scale. The results of our study suggest that regulatory environmental policies should not be hindered by short-term scale effects. Instead, further innovations are required to minimize the cost of energy savings. • The energy saving effect of China's Top-10,000 program is quantified • Utilization of a vast firm-level dataset employing regression discontinuity design • A pioneering assessment of the energy savings achieved through the Top-10,000 Program • Firms reduce production scale in the short-term responding to energy-saving policies • Firms expand production scale in the long-run reacting to energy-saving policies [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tackling fuel poverty has become an increasingly important issue on many European countries’ political agendas. Consequently, national governments, local authorities and NGOs have established policies and programmes to reduce the fuel poverty vulnerability of households. However, evaluations of such policies and programmes show that they barely reach those who are most in need. The reasons for this failure are diverse and include fuel poverty measurement metrics, local scale data availability and policy design. This raises the question of how fuel poor homes can be more effectively identified and targeted to ensure that limited local and national budgets are used to benefit those who most need help. Area-based approaches, which pinpoint spatial units highly affected by fuel poverty due to their specific characteristics, offer an opportunity for creating more tailored policies and programmes. In this study, the author developed a GIS-MCDA (Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis), using an AHP (Analytical Hierarchy Process) and applied the approach to the German city of Oberhausen. The overall issue of fuel poverty was broken down into three vulnerability dimensions (heating burden, socio-economic and building vulnerability), the relative importance of fuel poverty criteria and the dimensions were evaluated by experts, and an overall Fuel Poverty Index was created to assess the relative fuel poverty vulnerability of 168 urban neighbourhoods. The analysis offers insights into the spatial pattern of fuel poverty within a city and thus provides an opportunity to channel efforts towards households in those neighbourhoods most in need. It also demonstrates that a trade-off between ecological and social targets should be considered in the development of future policies for tackling fuel poverty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transport is the lifeblood of a nation’s economy. Because fossil fuels are being gradually depleted and global warming phenomena are becoming more and more serious, the aim of this article is to study a low-carbon transport infrastructure based on existing energy efficiency indices and green transport policy formulated by Taiwanese Department of Transportation. First, via data collection and analysis, we observed that small passenger cars and large trucks are the largest energy users in the transport sector due to their high energy intensities and large transport volumes. Therefore, the energy-conserving potentials of these vehicles are the focus of this study. According to “Top-Down” methodology, the most effective and economical energy-saving strategies for Taiwan׳s transport sector are the significant adoption of rail transport and electrification mode. With a maximum energy-saving scenario, including the adoption of Best Available Technologies (BAT) and the comprehensive expansion of public transport infrastructure, the energy savings potential in the land transport sector of Taiwan is 2931 million liters of oil equivalent (MLOEs). This savings is equivalent to a greenhouse gas emissions reduction of approximately 5.91 Mt CO 2e with a scale of 16.73% or crediting 2.40% reduction in national greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Finally, we suggest that the green transport infrastructure of Taiwan should primarily include railway, mass rapid transit (MRT), and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Partial shading is a condition where, the panels in a photovoltaic (PV) array do not receive uniform irradiation. Shading causes mismatch in the electrical characteristics of the panels composing the PV array and results in significant reduction in the energy yield. The reduction in output is not proportional to the shaded area but depends on the extent of mismatch that in turn depends on other factors like array size, type of configuration chosen, position of the panels in the array and shading pattern. To reduce the severity of this issue and to improve the energy yield under shaded conditions, it is therefore necessary to analyze the role played by each one of the contributing factors in greater detail. This paper presents a detailed analysis focusing mainly on the role played by the array size, array configuration (interconnections among the panels) and the shading pattern on the energy yield under partial shading conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent decades, China has witnessed substantial progress in urbanization and industrialization and has become the manufacturing center of the world, but has suffered from severe environmental deterioration, especially air pollution. National and provincial governments have adopted a series of policy tools aiming at energy conservation and emission reduction, varying from energy saving regulations to cleaner production policies. This paper investigates provincial energy saving and emission reduction policies by evaluating their effectiveness on local air pollution control. Relying on a panel data regression analysis on a sample of 26 provinces and four centrally-controlled municipalities over a ten-year period from 2002 to 2011, we find empirical support for the positive impacts of provincial energy saving regulations and two environmental standards on the improvement of local air quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper examines the development of policy instruments that support the low-carbon governance in China. The instruments are analysed in five aspects in relation to the key policies in low-carbon governance in China, including: energy conservation, developing new energy, reforestry, developing circular economy, and industry restructuring. Each aspect is discussed in three instrument groups which are (1) law and regulations, (2) industry standard and (3) finance and taxation. This research suggests that law enforcement for the new established laws should be further strengthened and stricter supervision systems should be in place to safeguard effective implementation of low carbon policies, measures and standards, especially for those energy condensed sectors. More rigorous industry standards regarding energy efficiency should be considered to help eliminate outdated equipments in industries and promote the introduction of more climate-friendly technologies. The industrial standards should be given strong legal support in accountability, in order to enforce their complete application once in operation. New policies and instruments need to be introduced in order to reduce carbon print by landfill. The backward law and industrial standards in China should be upgraded more regularly, therefore to support the low carbon development strategy. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Great pressure to curb carbon emission and increased need for energy have forced China to develop an “energy saving and emission reduction” (ESER) plan. ESER has become China''s basic national policy, and a guideline for China''s energy and environmental issues during the 11th Five-Years Plan (2006–2010). ESER represents a recalibration of China''s economic model, moving away from growth-at-all-cost in favor of a more “balanced and sustainable” output. In 2007, China''s GDP grew by 11.4%, but emission of COD and SO2 decreased by 3.14% and 4.66% respectively compared to 2006, energy consumption for each unit of GDP declined by 3.27% also compared to 2006. ESER is also the engine behind reform of China''s traditional administrative system which has always favored economic growth over environmental protection. The ESER accountability system sets green efforts as a decisive factor in determining the career prospects of local leaders. Also, China''s State Environmental Protection Agency has been upgraded to the Ministry of Environmental Protection, gaining cabinet status for the first time. A greener future relative to the previous three decades can be anticipated with confidence for China provided that the best practices enunciated by ESER are taken to heart by policymakers. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: During last century, worldwide environment degradation gets more and more serious, and achieving environmental sustainable development is desirable. As many environmental issues are directly or indirectly energy related, energy sustainable development is one of the most important prerequisites for environmental sustainable development. Renewable energy technologies and energy conservation are two solutions for energy sustainable development. At present, energy-saving technology is a feasible and an effective way to achieve energy and environmental sustainable development, although renewable energy may be final solution to environmental issues. Building cooling, heating, and power (BCHP) technology, which usually use natural gas as primary energy, has high efficiency of energy utilization due to the utilization of distributed power generation and heat recovery, and thus is a promising energy conservation technology. BCHP can reduce pollutants emission and thus protects the environment besides improving IAQ and increasing reliability of building energy supply. As the largest developing country, China is just in the process of adjusting energy structure and improving energy efficiency. Because of its significant role in energy and environmental sustainable development, developing BCHP in China will help the country in optimizing energy proportion, increasing energy efficiency, and protecting environment. Therefore, BCHP technology will have broad prospects in China and it will promote the country''s energy and environmental sustainable development. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]