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Abstract: The pulp and paper industry is the most important industrial sector for water pollution control in China. The current paper develops a technology-based model to assess alternative water pollution reduction policies in the pulp and paper industry up to 2020. Five policy scenarios are established to represent measures of raw material substitution, eliminating backward small-sized capacities, promoting cleaner technologies, advancing end-of-pipe treatment technologies and the integration of all these policies. Emission amounts of wastewater, chemical oxygen demand (COD), ammonia nitrogen (NH4-N) and absorbable organic halides (AOX) under different scenarios and corresponding economic costs are calculated. Among all individual policy measures, production capacity replacement has the best pollution reduction effect and the largest capital investment demand. Promoting cleaner technology can bring more economic benefits with less investment because of its by-effects of material and energy saving. Although raw material substitution is a basic strategy in China''s paper industry, it does not show very significant pollution reduction effect on its own. Joint implementation of different policies is necessary in order to decrease gross emission amounts when total output keeps growing. The water pollution emission reduction target proposed in the development plan of China''s paper industry, i.e. 10–12% reduction of COD and NH4-N in 2015 based on 2010 level, can be fulfilled through integrated policy measures. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Papermaking enterprises are major polluters that cause water pollution and air pollution. This paper aims to provide analysis of the energy saving and emission reduction in papermaking enterprises.It is the inevitable choice of establishment industrial ecology park as the leading of the papermaking industry by the implementation of cleaner production and circulation economy. Shandong Haiyun efficient ecological park is taken for example.Researches of the developing strategies and policy support of energy saving and emission reduction is discussed. The paper is divided into five parts, the first part is the preface, the second part introduces the general of Haiyun efficient industrial park, the third part puts forward the scheme of clean production of Haiyun efficient ecological industrial park, the fourth part puts forward ecological industry pattern of Haiyun efficient ecological industrial park, the fifth part puts forward policy guarantee measures, and the sixth part makes the summary. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The power sector is one of the major CO2-emitting industries in China. It is also the first key emissions control industry included in China's national carbon trading market established in 2021. Therefore, based on the data of 30 provinces and cities in China from 2015 to 2022, this study analyzes the impact of the national carbon market policy on the carbon emissions of the power industry based on the generalized Difference-in-Difference (DID) model. Based on the method of text analysis, this paper constructs the carbon market policy intensity index of each region and incorporates it into the DID model. Empirical analysis finds that the national carbon market policy can significantly inhibit the carbon emissions of the power industry. However, the heterogeneity analysis of 30 provinces and cities shows that the national carbon market policy has a significant impact on the regions that already have a carbon pilot, but not on the non-pilot regions. Therefore, this paper demonstrates the effectiveness of the national carbon market policy in the power industry emissions control, and also exposes the heterogeneity between regions, providing an important empirical basis for the inclusion of other energy-intensive industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the ownership of vehicles and frequency of utilization increase, vehicle emissions have become an important source of air pollution in Chinese cities. An accurate emission inventory for on-road vehicles is necessary for numerical air quality simulation and the assessment of implementation strategies. This paper presents a bottom-up methodology based on the local emission factors, complemented with the widely used emission factors of Computer Programme to Calculate Emissions from Road Transport (COPERT) model and near real time (NRT) traffic data on road segments to develop a high temporal-spatial resolution vehicle emission inventory (HTSVE) for the urban Beijing area. To simulate real-world vehicle emissions accurately, the road has been divided into segments according to the driving cycle (traffic speed) on this road segment. The results show that the vehicle emissions of NOx, CO, HC and PM were 10.54×104, 42.51×104 and 2.13×104 and 0.41×104 Mg, respectively. The vehicle emissions and fuel consumption estimated by the model were compared with the China Vehicle Emission Control Annual Report and fuel sales thereafter. The grid-based emissions were also compared with the vehicular emission inventory developed by the macro-scale approach. This method indicates that the bottom-up approach better estimates the levels and spatial distribution of vehicle emissions than the macro-scale method, which relies on more information. Additionally, the on-road vehicle emission inventory model and control effect assessment system in Beijing, a vehicle emission inventory model, was established based on this study in a companion paper (He et al., 2015). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the largest energy consumer, China's control of carbon emissions from energy consumption plays a pivotal role in world climate governance. However, few studies have been conducted to explore the emission reduction pathways that promote a high level of synergy between China's economic growth and the " carbon peaking and carbon neutrality " goal from the perspective of energy consumption. Based on the measurement of energy consumption carbon emissions, this paper reveals the spatial and temporal distribution and evolution trends of carbon emissions in China at the national-provincial level. The multi-dimensional socio-economic factors such as R&D and urbanization are taken into account, and the LMDI model is used to decompose the driving effects of energy consumption carbon emissions at the national-provincial levels. Further, this paper combines the Tapio decoupling index with the LMDI model to decompose the decoupling states of China year by year and at the provincial level in four periods to explore the reasons for the change of carbon decoupling states. The results show that: (1) China's energy consumption carbon emissions grew at a high rate before 2013, and slowed down after that. There are significant differences in the scale and growth rate of carbon emissions among provinces, which can be classified into four types accordingly. (2) The R&D scale effect, urbanization effect, and population scale effect are the factors driving the growth of China's carbon emissions; while the energy structure effect, energy consumption industry structure effect, energy intensity effect, and R&D efficiency effect inhibit the growth of China's carbon emissions. (3) Weak decoupling is the most dominant decoupling state in China from 2003 to 2020, and the decoupling state varies significantly among provinces. According to the conclusions, this paper proposes targeted policy recommendations based on China's energy endowment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's renewable energy products have an important place in international trade, and the conclusion of the RCEP agreement can create favourable external conditions for China's renewable energy product exports. This paper measures the export potential of China's renewable energy products to other RCEP countries through a trade gravity model. The results show that (1) the GDP of the importing and exporting countries, the energy consumption of the importing countries, and the particulate emissions damage significantly enhance China's renewable energy product exports; (2) among the RCEP countries, China has a greater potential to export renewable energy products to five countries in 2020, which are mainly located in East and Southeast Asia; and (3) from a dynamic perspective, China's renewable energy trade potential is increasing, while in the Oceania region it is weakening, while trade links to Southeast Asian countries are developing in a more mature direction. Based on the above research, this paper puts forward corresponding policy recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To better address climate change and environmental pollution, it is of great practical significance to comprehensively evaluate the impact of low-carbon energy transition policies on carbon emission reduction. This paper conducts a policy quantitative evaluation of low-carbon energy transition policies from three dimensions: policy intensity, policy objective, and policy instrument. On this basis, the ridge regression model is used to analyze the carbon emission reduction effect of policies. The results show that (1) changes in policy quantities mainly cause the evolution of total policy effectiveness. The government's emphasis on low-carbon energy transition has fluctuated. (2) The two policy objectives of optimizing the use of fossil energy and developing a low-carbon concept are less synergistic with other policy objectives and neither has a significant impact on carbon reduction. (3) The government prefers to adopt command control policy instruments, but their actual carbon emission reduction effects are inferior to that of economic incentive policy instruments. These findings can provide a decision-making basis for the government to further formulate and optimize policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rapid development of the aviation industry significantly impacts global climate change. The carbon Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) and Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAFs) are considered two essential ways for the aviation industry to reduce emissions. This paper uses China-foreign routes, the fastest growing region in the world, as an example to calculate the actual emissions (CO2, CO, HC, NOx, SO2, and PM2.5), calculate the Carbon Dioxide Equivalent Concentration (CDEC) using the Aviation FAIR-GWP concentration method, to compare the role of the ETS and SAFs in controlling emissions until the year 2100. The results show that SAFs are more effective in controlling the pollutant emissions of the aircraft than ETS, as ETS mainly covers CO2 and ignores other greenhouse gases. However, the best way is to combine SAFs and ETS; the combined effect is much better than SAFs alone or ETS alone. The research results provide systematic suggestions for the aviation industry to reduce emissions effectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Since 2020, China has been dedicated to the goal of "carbon peak and carbon neutrality" in the international community, demonstrating its commitment to energy conservation and emissions control. In 2021, in response to the guidance of the State Council, all provinces in China included the creation of a low-carbon economic system as one of their key development goals. This paper aims at investigating the low-carbon economic development efficiency and the redundancy of inefficient areas of Guangdong Province by using the three-stage DEA-Malmquist index model. Panel data of 21 cities from 2011 to 2020 in Guangdong Province were selected. Results revealed that the low-carbon economic development efficiency in the whole province rises, but the growth rate has slowed down in the past three years. Pearl River Delta area is better-developed in low-carbon economy than others. It is recommended to improve the efficiency of scale, make use of environmental advantages and develop energy-saving and emission reduction technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China has established and assigned target responsibilities for local officials in energy conservation and created an evaluation indicator, which is a key institutional arrangement that provides local officials with political incentives to promote carbon abatement policies. In this paper, we elaborate on the relationship between China's target responsibility system and CO2 emissions using interprovincial panel data, grouping provinces into Eastern, Central and Western regions to compare China's CO2 emissions convergence between the periods of the 10th Five-year Plan and the 11th Five-year Plan. The analysis indicates that the target responsibility system does not noticeably change local officials' political incentives to engage in carbon abatement because the effect of the target responsibility system for energy conservation seems to be overshadowed by and subject to gross domestic product (GDP) growth targets. Against the backdrop of growing international pressure on climate change issues, this paper argues that China must include in the target responsibility system an indicator of absolute CO2 emissions reduction as a policy objective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To deal with severe air pollution arising from rapid development, a series of air pollution control policies have been implemented in China. Previous literature has explored the short-term economic impacts of air pollution control, but the long-term economic impacts, which can better reflect the effectiveness of air pollution control, have received less attention. This paper has constructed an integrated assessment framework combining a multi-sectoral computable general equilibrium (CGE) model, air quality estimation module, and health impact module, to explore the short-term (2016) and long-term (2030) impacts of air pollution control on China's economy, by setting 2015 as the base year. The possible future air pollution reduction scenarios were set based on the Thirteenth Five-Year Plan (FYP13) proposed by the Chinese government. Our results have shown that air pollution control would harm China's economy and such adverse effects would be increased by stricter pollution reduction targets. Taking the health benefits of air pollution control into account can effectively alleviate the GDP losses, and even reverse them into economic benefits in the long term. Compared with business-as-usual (BAU) scenario (no policy constraints on SO2 and NOx emissions), the impact of air pollution control on GDP in the TAC_VIII scenario (emission reduction targets of 20% for SO2 and NOx are set every five years after 2015) would change from a loss of 1.20% in 2016 to an increase of 0.28% in 2030. Our results can provide policy implications for the optimization of China's air emissions control in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the challenges that China currently faces is how to reduce the emissions of water pollution. However, the study of water pollution convergence has a certain policy significance for controlling the emissions of water pollution. This article firstly uses chemical oxygen demand (COD) and ammonia nitrogen (NH3–N) as indicators of water pollution. Due to the obvious spillover effect of water in space, this article adds a spatial effect to the convergence model. Based on panel data of 30 provinces and cities from 2006 to 2017, this article uses a dynamic spatial Dubin model to analyze the convergence of water pollution emission intensity to address the endogenous problem in the model. The empirical results of this paper show that there is absolute β-convergence and conditional β-convergence in the intensity of water pollution emissions. The spatial autocorrelation test shows that there is a positive spatial autocorrelation of water pollution emissions, which means that the pollution emissions in neighboring areas will affect the emissions in the local area. The industrial structure has a certain promoting effect on the emission of water pollution, which means that adjusting the industrial structure and alleviating the structure of the secondary industry is the trend of future development. Economic growth can curb the emissions of water pollution. The influences of urbanization and foreign investment on the emissions of the two pollutants are inconsistent, and policies can be formulated according to local conditions in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to control the air pollution caused by ships and improve ambient air quality, China set up three domestic emission control areas (DECAs) in 2015 in the Pearl River Delta, the Yangtze River Delta and Bohai Rim (Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei) waters. In order to meet the emission requirements established at the 70th meeting of the Marine Environmental Protection Committee (MEPC), China intends to apply for the establishment of three international Emission Control Area (ECA) in 2030 for these DECAs. This paper discusses existing technologies to reduce emissions of nitrogen oxides (NOx) and sulphur oxides (SOx), and examines the abatement costs for the shipping industry in the year 2030 to comply with this action. Based on an examination of the literature and data collected for this study, four traditional alternatives, low-sulphur fuel, sulphur scrubbers/exhaust gas cleaning systems (EGCS), selective catalytic reduction (SCR), and exhaust gas recirculation, are analyzed. The analysis finds that switching to low-sulphur fuel is the best technical solution for SOx emission reduction, and the installation of SCR is the best technology for reducing nitrogen. In addition to traditional emission reduction technologies, the use of shore power facilities and liquefied natural gas (LNG), two alternatives welcomed by China's green shipping industry, are also considered in this paper. The expected average abatement cost of these alternatives in the year 2030 are USD 2.866 billion, 0.324 billion, 1.071 billion, 0.402 billion, 0.232 billion and 0.34 billion, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emission trading system is an effective market-oriented means to control pollutant emission, and reasonable initial allocation of emission rights is the premise of its smooth implementation. However, at present, the initial allocation of emission rights depends largely on the amount of emissions, which leads to weak positive guidance effect for enterprises. To explore the optimal initial allocation method of SO2 emission rights, this paper takes 8 thermal power plants in Dalian, China, as the research objects to calculate the initial allocation of SO2 emission rights, because SO2 is the main cause of acid rain, which is one of the most serious air pollution in China, and thermal power plants are among the main SO2 emitters. Firstly, an indicator system is established considering enterprise size, pollutant discharge, and social contributions, as well as pollution control capacity. Then, the combination weighting method is developed through integrating the subjective methods G1 and G2 with the objective ones, entropy and maximum deviation. The empirical results show that the enterprises with more desulfurization equipment or large heating supply are supposed to get more emission rights; the actual emission value of SO2 in half of the enterprises exceeds the theoretical ones; SO2 removal rate, desulfurization equipment quantity, and heating supply exert the most positive effects on the initial allocation of emission rights. The constructed model can be used as a reference for future research of initial allocation of other pollutants' emission rights. Also, the implications have been proposed for the government, industry, and enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Managing Shipping Emission Control Areas The design of emission control areas (ECAs) is crucial for reducing global shipping emissions and protecting the environment. In "Shipping Emission Control Area Optimization Considering Carbon Emission Reduction," Zhuge, Wang, and Zhen focus on the ECA optimization problem for sailing legs with ECAs. First, a case with a no-ECA policy and a case with the current ECA policy are discussed. Then, two new voyage-dependent ECA policies with sulfur limits, designated sailing paths, and speed limits are proposed, under which Stackelberg game models with the ECA regulator and a shipping company are developed. The authors extend the research problem from a sailing leg to a shipping network to improve the practicality of the findings. They also develop a dynamic programming-based algorithm to optimize the ECA policies for the shipping network from the perspective of the ECA regulator. The effectiveness of the proposed policies in reducing social costs is validated by numerical experiments. Sulfur emission control areas (ECAs) are crucial for reducing global shipping emissions and protecting the environment. The main plank of an ECA policy is usually a fuel sulfur limit. However, the approaches to setting sulfur limits are relatively subjective and lack scientific support. This paper investigates the design of ECA policies, especially sulfur limits, for sailing legs with ECAs. The objective is to minimize the social costs of shipping operations, local sulfur oxides (SOx) emissions, and global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. First, a case with a no-ECA policy and a case with the current ECA policy are analyzed. Then, two new voyage-dependent ECA policies with sulfur limits, designated sailing paths, and speed limits are proposed. Stackelberg game models are developed to solve the research problem with the two proposed policies and two players: the ECA regulator and a shipping company aiming to minimize social costs and company costs, respectively. The ECA regulator determines the sulfur limit, sailing path, and speed limit, and the shipping company optimizes the sailing speed accordingly. We also compare and analyze each type of cost under different ECA policies (i.e., no ECA, the current ECA policy, and the proposed ECA policies). The research problem is then extended from a sailing leg to a shipping network to improve the practicality of the findings. A dynamic programming-based algorithm is developed to optimize the ECA policies for the shipping network from the perspective of the ECA regulator. Mathematical derivation shows that the proposed ECA policies can reduce the social costs of shipping. The results of extensive numerical experiments further demonstrate the ability of the proposed policies to reduce social costs, providing important insights for voyage-dependent ECA policy design. Funding: This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [Grants 72025103, 72201163, 71831008, 72071173, 72371221, 72394360, 72394362, and 72361137001]. Supplemental Material: The e-companion is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/opre.2022.0361. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To reduce carbon emissions effectively in Shandong province in New Normal economy, this paper presents a new way to reflect the situation of carbon emissions accurately from both time-perspective and spatial perspective. The characteristics of carbon emissions in Shandong province are presented during 2005-2014, and this paper explores the spatial autocorrelation of carbon emissions branches in 17 cities. The results show that the total amount of carbon emissions in Shandong province presented a steady growth, whereas the growth rate was low, and the proportion of coal consumption in energy structure was significantly higher than the national average. In addition, the spatial pattern of the carbon emissions in 17 cities presented obvious regionally distinction. Furthermore, the affecting factors governing carbon emissions are decomposed based on the Kaya identity. The results reveal that economic scale was the key factor to increase the carbon emissions, whereas energy efficiency was the main factor of carbon emissions reduction. Therefore, this paper draws government should promote carbon emissions reduction given priority to some regions virtually, while encouraging emission reduction in others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose This paper aims to explore the relationship between environmental regulation, technological innovation and manufacturing quality competitiveness to provide some references for emission reduction activities and improvements in manufacturing quality competitiveness to achieve environmental protection targets and economic development as part of a win–win situation.Design/methodology/approach Based on the structure-behavior-performance paradigm and Grabowski’s research, a new empirical model was provided. The software, EViews 6.0, was used for econometric analysis. Regression analysis was adopted to explore the three indicators’ relationships.Findings First, environmental regulation can promote technological innovation effectively. Second, compared with wasted gas and wasted solids, investment in wasted water control promotes Chinese technological innovation most. Third, the impact of research and development investment, induced by environmental regulation, on manufacturing quality competitiveness is greater than that induced by non-environmental regulation. Fourth, the impact of lagged two-phase environmental regulation on manufacturing quality competitiveness is similar to that of lagged one-phase regulation.Practical implications The issue that Chinese manufacturing is facing is how to manage the trade-off between pollution control investment and improved quality competitiveness. This study enables managers to understand how to better implement environmental regulation initiatives while achieving environmental protection and quality competitiveness as part of a win–win situation.Originality/value This paper analyzes the relationships between environmental regulation, technological innovation and manufacturing quality competitiveness for the first time and provides the basic argument for integrating Chinese environmental regulation with quality competitiveness to reveal the uniqueness of the circumstances determining China’s economic development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The air pollution situation in the northern part of China has become a threat to the current status of China's energy consumption. This has created pressure to relocate coal plants to the western section of the country. We apply a spatial panel data method to empirically examine the relationship between fine particulate matter (PM2.5) concentration, precipitation and wind speed by using the sample data of 50 cities over 11 months. Based on the empirical parameters, the paper simulates the potential impacts of the proposed coal plants and the coal plants currently under construction for the PM2.5 concentrations across all cities once these coal plants are operational. The results show that the new capacities will increase PM2.5 concentrations in northwest and northeast China, but at acceptable levels and lower than levels in Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei and Shandong. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nitrate is an increasingly important component of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in Chinese cities. The production of nitrate is not only related to the abundance of its precursor, but it is also supported by the atmospheric photochemical oxidants, raising a new challenge for the current emission control actions in China. This paper uses comprehensive measurements and a regional meteorology–chemistry model with optimized mechanisms to establish the nonlinear responses between particulate nitrate and the emission controls of nitrogen oxides (NOx) in the megalopolises of China. Nitrate is an essential component of PM2.5 in eastern China, accounting for 9.4 %–15.5 % and 11.5 %–32.1 % of the PM2.5 mass for the warm and cold seasons. The hypothetical NOx emission reduction scenarios (- 10 % to - 80 %) during summer–autumn result in almost linearly lower PM2.5 by - 2.2 % in Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei (BTH) and - 2.9 % in Yangtze River Delta (YRD) per 10 % reduction of NOx emissions, whereas they lead to a rather complicated response of PM components in winter. Wintertime nitrate is found to increase by + 4.1 % in BTH and + 5.1 % in YRD per 10 % reduction of NOx emissions, with nearly unchanged nitric acid (HNO3) and higher dinitrogen pentoxide (N 2 O 5) intermediate products produced from the increased atmospheric oxidant levels. An inflexion point appears at 30 %–50 % NOx emission reduction, and a further reduction in NOx emissions is predicted to cause - 10.5 % reduction of nitrate for BTH and - 7.7 % for YRD per 10 % reduction of NOx emissions. In addition, the 2012–2016 NOx control strategy actually leads to no changes or even increases of nitrate in some areas (8.8 % in BTH and 14.4 % in YRD) during winter. Our results also emphasize that ammonia (NH3) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are effective in controlling nitrate pollution, whereas decreasing the sulfur dioxide (SO2) and NOx emissions may have counterintuitive effects on nitrate aerosols. This paper helps understand the nonlinear aerosol and photochemistry feedbacks and defines the effectiveness of proposed mitigations for the increasingly serious nitrate pollution in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Industrial digital transformation is a key engine to help developing countries reduce pollution and carbon emissions. We used the composite system synergy model (CSSM) and modified entropy weight method to measure the degree of synergy between pollution and carbon emissions control (SPCEC) and the level of industrial digitization in each province and city based on the Chinese inter-provincial panel data from 2011 to 2020. We then used the two-way fixed effects and panel quantile regression models to test the heterogeneous influence of industrial digitization on the SPCEC. We found that: (1) industrial digitization had a positive contribution to the SPCEC. (2) Digitization of industry contributes more to the SPCEC level than the digitization of agriculture and services. (3) The promotion of SPCEC by industrial digitization is significant in the western region, but not in the eastern, central and northeastern regions. (4) In provinces and municipalities with lower level of SPCEC, the contribution of industrial digitization to the SPCEC is higher. This paper reveals the impact of industrial digitization on the SPCEC and can provide a policy reference for the realization of the SPCEC from the perspective of the integration of industry and digitization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Long-term erosion and repeated scouring of water significantly affect the technical properties of coals, which are the essential elements that must be considered in evaluating an underground reservoir coal column dam's standing sustainability. In the paper, the coal pillar dam body of the 22 layers of coal in the Shangwan Coal Mine is studied (22 represents No. 2 coal seam), and the water content of this coal pillar dam body is simplified into two types of different water content and dry–wet cycle. Through acoustic emission detection technology and energy dissipation analysis method, the internal failure mechanism of coal water action is analyzed. This study revealed three findings. (1) The crest pressure, strain, and resilient modulus in the coal sample were inversely related to the water content along with the dry–wet cycle number, while the drying–wetting cycle process had a certain time effect on the failure to the sample. (2) As the moisture content and the dry–wet cycle times incremented, three features were shown: first, the breakage pattern is the mainly stretching fracture for the coal specimen; second, the number and absolute value of acoustic emission count peaks decrease; third, the RA-AF probability density plot (RA is the ratio of AE Risetime and Amplitude, and AF is the ratio of AE Count and Duration) corresponds more closely to the large-scale destruction characteristics for the coal samples. (3) A higher quantity of wet and dry cycles results in a smoother energy dissipation curve in the compacted and flexible phases of the crack, indicating that this energy is released earlier. The research results can be applied to the long-term sustainability assessment of the dams of coal columns for underground reservoirs and can also serve as valuable content to the excogitation of water-bearing coal column dams under similar engineering conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effectiveness of carbon price in emissions trading schemes (ETS) is an important issue in China in the context of its ambitious climate change goals. This paper adopts a staggered difference-in-differences model to estimate whether China's ETS reduced CO2 emissions while maintaining economic growth even under low carbon prices. The results indicate that despite the low carbon prices, the ETS effectively reduced CO2 emissions without undermining the economy. Specifically, an increase of $1 in the carbon price reduced CO2 emissions by 1.69% and increased the per capita GDP by $286. The carbon price primarily achieved emission reduction and promoted economic development through channels, such as technological innovation, foreign direct investment, energy mix, and industrial structure. Carbon leakage to neighboring regions was not evident. Heterogeneity analysis showed that the environmental effects of the carbon price were more pronounced in regions with higher levels of economic development and CO2 emissions. Conversely, the economic effects of the carbon price were more pronounced in regions with lower levels of economic development and CO2 emissions. The carbon price achieved significant economic effects in regions that solely adopted the free allocation mode of emission allowances, while regions that used a combination of free allocation and auctioning experienced substantial emission reduction effects. Despite low carbon prices, China's ETS effectively reduced CO2 emissions without compromising economic growth. This finding provides new empirical evidence for the effectiveness of carbon price as well as decision support for the future promotion of ETS. Technological innovation, FDI, energy mix, and industrial structure are crucial channels through which the carbon price achieves emission reduction and promotes economic development. The absence of carbon leakage to neighboring regions suggests that ETS is an internally effective mechanism for emission control. Heterogeneity analysis showed that regional characteristics and allowance allocation modes can influence the effectiveness of carbon price, thus emphasizing the importance of targeted policy design and appropriate allocation methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's rapid economic growth is accompanied by industrial agglomeration (IA) and environmental pollution. Although IA has played an important role in reducing environmental pollution, its effect on carbon emissions is still debatable and deserves further study. In this context, this paper constructs a two-sector general equilibrium model including households and firms to explore the mechanisms of IA on carbon emissions and finds that IA mainly affects carbon emissions through the agglomeration effect and congestion effect. Then, based on the balanced panel data for 30 Chinese provinces from 2003 to 2019, this study employs the dynamic spatial panel model to investigate the nexus between different types of IA and carbon emissions. The empirical results reveal that a significant positive spatial dependence is verified in the regional carbon emissions of China, indicating that carbon emissions exhibit a remarkably spatial spillover effect. Meanwhile, there are significant variations in the influence of different types of IA on carbon emissions. Specifically, specialized agglomeration (SA) positively affects carbon emissions, while the impact of diversified agglomeration (DA) on carbon emissions is negative, implying that China's DA may contribute to carbon emission control. In addition, there is regional heterogeneity in the effect of IA on carbon emissions, with the western region having a significantly greater effect than the eastern and central regions. Therefore, the Chinese government should follow the notion of integrating territory administration and interregional communication and formulate regionally differentiated environmental governance policies to promote carbon emission reduction in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the main means to dovetail the domestic system with international rules, institutional openness is the key to deepening participation in the global economic governance system, breaking through energy and carbon emission constraints, and achieving green and sustainable economic development. Taking 284 prefecture-level cities in China from 2006 to 2019 as the research sample, this paper uses the establishment of Pilot Free Trade Zones as a quasi-natural experiment to systematically identify and test the actual impact of institutional openness on urban carbon emissions in China through the asymptotic difference in difference method, instrumental variables method, spatial econometric model, and mediating effects model. Meanwhile, technological progress is used as the entry point to analyze the intrinsic mechanism of action by adopting digital transformation oriented to efficiency improvement and green innovation capability oriented to R&D innovation as the differentiated perspective. It is found that institutional openness significantly suppresses urban CO2 emissions, and there is a certain heterogeneity and spatial spillover effect of this effect. Further study finds that institutional openness achieves carbon emission reduction through technological progress. The study aims to find new institutional innovation and development paths for low carbon development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent years have seen considerable debate about the practicability of a global quantity/price commitment to control carbon emissions and tackle environmental issues. In this paper, we study the impact of the cap-and-trade policy (quantity commitment) and the carbon tax policy (price commitment) on a firm's technology investment and production decisions. The main feature captured in our model is that there exist correlated uncertainties between the sales market (demand uncertainty) and the permit trading market (permit price volatility) under the cap-and-trade policy. The correlation relationship stands on the following intuition. The demands for final products affect firms' production output, which generates the needs of emission permits and influences the permit price. We show that under the cap-and-trade policy, with the uncertainty of the future emission price, the firm could flexibly adjust its production quantity to enhance its profit, resulting in low incentives to invest in clean technology. However, as the (positive) correlation between the sales market and the permit trading market increases, the production flexibility is constrained so that the firm has to increase its technology investment to hedge against the future risk of a high emission price. Making a comparison between the cap-and-trade and carbon tax policies, we find that when the correlation coefficient is moderate, the carbon tax policy generates a multiwin situation (i.e., more technology investment, higher expected profit and consumer surplus, and fewer carbon emissions). Case studies are provided to illustrate the implications and model variants are examined to check the robustness of the main results. Overall, our analysis sheds light on recent debate over carbon pricing and identifies the important role of correlated uncertainties in carbon policy design. This paper was accepted by Charles Corbett, operations management. Funding: This work was supported by the stable support plan program of Shenzhen Natural Science Fund [Program Contract 20200925160533002] and the National Natural Science Foundation of China [Grant 72101105]. Supplemental Material: The data files and online appendix are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2022.4365. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The low-carbon development of power industry is the key to low-carbon development of the whole society. In order to determine appropriate and feasible emission reduction policies, it is necessary to identify the contribution of different drivers to the change of carbon emissions in China's power sector and to simulate the potential evolution trend of carbon emissions. This paper constructs LMDI model to analyze the driving factors of carbon emission changes in China's power industry from 2000 to 2018 and uses Monte Carlo algorithm to simulate the evolution trend of carbon emission under different scenarios. We can find (1) economic output effect reached 3.817 billion tons from 2000 to 2018, which was the primary factor to increase the carbon emission. Population scale effect reached 251million tons, which had a weak promotion impact on carbon emission. (2) Conversion efficiency effect played a role in restraining carbon emissions, reaching 699 million tons from 2000 to 2018. (3) Emission factor effect and power intensity effect have obvious volatility. The power structure effect showed great volatility before 2013 and mainly played a role in restraining carbon emission after 2013. (4) Under the baseline scenario, the carbon emission of China's power industry shows a growth trend. Under green development scenario and enhanced carbon reduction scenario, the carbon emission shows a trend of first increasing and then decreasing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Achieving China's carbon reduction targets for 2020 necessitates the consideration of integrated production chains (PCs) given that competition between sectors has been transformed into competition between PCs. This paper establishes an extended input-output (IO) model that calculates the cost multiplier transmission effect of emission reduction in low-carbon production chains (LCPCs). Empirical results show that in relation to PCs, the electricity power industry and urban residents are the key policy points in adjusting China's industrial structure. This paper suggests that policymakers consider the cost multiplier transmission effect imposed by upstream sectors to downstream industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On December 19th, 2017, China's Emissions Trading System (CETS) was officially launched, firstly only covering the power industry. Cap setting and allowance allocation are urgent issues for the government. Because of the different characteristics of sectors, this paper tries to propose a reasonable and effective allocation scheme from the industry perspective for the government. Firstly, it adopts traditional methods, namely grandfathering and benchmarking. Secondly, it proposes theoretical allocation schemes. Finally, the most effective scheme is selected for sectors. Results show that quotas of grandfathering scheme are larger than that of benchmarking scheme. Among four theoretical scenarios, quotas in the preferring capacity scenario are the lowest and those in the preferring potential scenario are the highest. Quotas of the manufacturing and electricity, gas, and water production and supply industries are higher. In the industrial sectors, quotas of the light and high-tech industries are lower. Results of regional quotas calculations in the preferring capacity scheme are consistent with the regional carbon intensity reduction target in the 13th Five-Year Plan Work Program for Controlling GHG Emissions. After comparing all schemes, this paper determines that theoretical scheme is the most effective for its balance on emissions reduction and development of sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to conduct an empirical study to evaluate the influence of built environment features and socioeconomic factors on commuters’ simultaneous choice of departure time and travel mode. Using Kunming, China, as the study region, the 2015 Regional Household Travel Survey and 2016 Point of Interest data are used in the analysis. The results show that, in addition to socioeconomic factors, built environment, such as the density of residential building, employment, and service facility are correlated with joint choice behavior. Moreover, there exist differences regarding the influence of built environment and socioeconomic factors on departure time and travel mode choice. The dissimilarity parameters show that commuters prefer to shift travel mode than departure time generally when travel condition alters. In order to examine the policy measures’ potential performance, the paper conducts simulation tests based on the Monte Carlo method. The simulation results show that congestion pricing of car travel during peak hours can reduce the number of commuting trips, and reducing travel time of public transit would be a better strategy to attract more passengers during peak hours. Moreover, reasonable land use planning, such as building more bus stops around commuters’ home location, would be a long term and fundamental approach to reduce mobile-source emissions and attract more public transit passengers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the long-term and short-term relationships between renewable energy consumption, output and export, and CO2 emissions in China over the period 1990–2020 from the perspective of industry and agriculture using econometric methods. The results of the study found that there is a long-run relationship and there is a causality between these variables, indicating that renewable energy consumption, output, and export are related to CO2 emissions. Specifically, from a long-term perspective, the results of co-integration and causality reveal that there is a two-way causal relationship between renewable energy consumption, output, export, and CO2 emissions, supporting the feedback hypothesis; that is, output and export have an adverse impact on the environment, while renewable energy consumption has a favorable impact on the environment. In the short term, there is a direct or indirect one-way causal relationship between export, CO2 emissions, and renewable energy consumption, which supports the growth hypothesis. The impulse response analysis has further verified the causality test results and supported this hypothesis. However, there is a strong negative correlation between industrial and agricultural export and renewable energy consumption, which will cause the use of renewable energy to fail to meet the peak demand for industrial and agricultural export in the short term. Conversely, large amounts of fossil fuels will be consumed to meet output and export demand. Therefore, on the road to social, economic, and environmental sustainability, it is necessary to consider the impact of economic growth and energy consumption (renewable and non-renewable energy) of related industries on CO2 emissions, which also provides a strong basis for the development and reduction of China's renewable energy and the long-term implementation of the emission control policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cheng, H.; Li, F., and Mao, Q., 2015. The empirical analysis on the influence of CO2 emission regulation on the export transformation of Chinese manufacturing industries. Since China has begun to implement stringent CO2 emission regulation, foreign trade competitiveness suffers from great impact. Under fixed emission regulation concerning different emission distribution methods, there exist differences in effects on export competitiveness as well as industrial transformation and upgrading. In this paper, based on the bilateral panel data of China and 32 trading partners during 1992 and 2011, model of multiple panel regression is applied to conduct empirical analysis on the influence of CO2 emission regulation. The results show that the enhancement of CO2 emission regulation is conducive to the improvement of the export competitiveness of Chinese manufacturing industries. Meanwhile, there are different influence degrees of regulation on various industries, among which the clean industry is the most influenced by the regulation. As for various manufacturing industries, there are three distribution policies, namely, emission distribution on the basis of output, average distribution on the basis of unit emission and accumulative distribution on the basis of unit emission. Moreover, the advantages and disadvantages of the influences of these three policies on export competitiveness, transformation and upgrading of Chinese manufacturing industries would be compared so as to determine which distribution policy is most beneficial. The results illustrate that 'average CO2 emission distribution on the basis of unit emission' makes the greatest contribution to the export transformation and upgrading of Chinese manufacturing industries, and it is in conformity with development need of Chinese trade at current phase. The innovation of the paper lies in its adoption of bilateral trade data to specifically study the influence of CO2 emission regulation on trade competitiveness. The attention is specially attached to the performance differences of different emission distribution policies in trade competitiveness, which is the further exploration on the basis of previous studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the asymmetric effect of financial development on CO2 emissions in China by controlling for the effects of economic growth and energy consumption. So far, no consensus has been found as regards the nature and the intensity of the relationship between CO2 emissions and financial development in China. While most previous studies found a positive effect of financial development on the environment, there have been also studies showing that financial development increases CO2 emissions in China or has no effect on it. Moreover, these studies have not accounted for a possible asymmetric impact that financial development can have on CO2 emissions in China. The empirical study in this paper is carried out with the unit root test with structural breaks and the nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag model. The obtained results show that an asymmetric effect exists. An increase in financial development helps decreasing CO2 emission. These results show the importance to support financial development in China to decrease CO2 emissions while sustaining economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As economic development rapidly progresses in China, a method of carbon emission control that provides reasonable solutions is needed. This paper analyzes the convergence of carbon emission evolutionary characteristics in different regions of China and studies the dynamics of carbon emissions in China based on a convergence model. It was found that the carbon emission levels of each region are prominent in terms of time, and the regional carbon emission level has absolute β characteristics. The regional carbon emission condition β convergences have different convergence paths. Therefore, it is necessary to justify carbon emission reduction in China and put forward an emission reduction strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates the influences of different industries on the carbon prices and selects the industries with high market power in the carbon market. To realize price discovery in the carbon market and improve the market efficiency, we suggest that industries with higher market power should be included in the market prior to other industries. Using the LASSO regression to analyze the data from the pilot markets of China's ETS and related industrial product outputs, we find that among all related industries, the petrochemical and chemical industries affect the carbon price the most and hence should be included in China's ETS with priority. The power generation industry, though regarded as the major entity of emission control, imposes weaker influences on the carbon price. Industries that may be incorporated in China's ETS later include the transportation equipment manufacturing and the mining and metal industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new long-term emission inventory called the Inversed Emission Inventory for Chinese Air Quality (CAQIEI) was developed in this study by assimilating surface observations from the China National Environmental Monitoring Centre (CNEMC) using the ensemble Kalman filter (EnKF) and the Nested Air Quality Prediction Modeling System (NAQPMS). This inventory contains the constrained monthly emissions of NOx, SO2, CO, primary PM2.5, primary PM10, and NMVOCs in China from 2013 to 2020, with a horizontal resolution of 15 km × 15 km. This paper documents detailed descriptions of the assimilation system and the evaluation results for the emission inventory. The results suggest that CAQIEI can effectively reduce the biases in the a priori emission inventory, with the normalized mean biases ranging from -9.1% to 9.5% in the a posteriori simulation, which are significantly reduced from the biases in the a priori simulations (-45.6% to 93.8%). The calculated RMSEs (0.3 mg/m³ for CO and 9.4-21.1 µg/m³ for other species, on the monthly scale) and correlation coefficients (0.76-0.94) were also improved from the a priori simulations, suggesting that CAQIEI can reasonably reproduce the magnitude and variation of emissions of different air pollutants in China. Based on CAQIEI, we estimated China's total emissions (including both natural and anthropogenic emissions) of the 6 species in 2015 to be as follows: 25.2 Tg of NOx, 17.8 Tg of SO2, 465.4 Tg of CO, 15.0 Tg of PM2.5, 40.1 Tg of PM10, and 46.0 Tg of NMVOCs. From 2015 to 2020, the total emissions reduced by 54.1% for SO2, 44.4% for PM2.5, 33.6% for PM10, 35.7% for CO, and 15.1% for NOx, but increased by 21.0% for NMVOCs. Larger emission reductions were achieved during the 2018-2020 action plan than during the 2013-2017 action plan for most species. In particular, NOx and NMVOC emissions were shown to increase during the 2013-2017 action plain, and there were obvious emission increases in the Fengwei Plain area over the Central China region. However, NOx and NMVOC emissions declined during the 2018-2020 action plan, and the emissions over the Fengwei Plain area also decreased. This suggests that the emission control policies were improved in the 2018-2020 action plan. We also compared CAQIEI with previous inventories, which verified our inversion results in terms of total emissions of NOx, SO2 and NMVOCs, and more importantly identified the potential uncertainties in our current understanding of China's air pollutant emissions. Firstly, CO emissions in China may be substantially underestimated by current inventories, with the CO emissions estimated by CAQIEI (426.8 Tg) being more than twice the amount in previous inventories (120.7-237.7 Tg). Significant underestimations for other air pollutant emissions may also exist over western and northeastern China. In addition, the NMVOC emissions were shown to be substantially underestimated over northern China but overestimated in southern China. Secondly, the emission reduction rates during 2015-2018 estimated by CAQIEI are generally smaller than those estimated by previous inventories, especially for NOx, PM10 and NMVOCs, suggesting that the mitigation effects of the air pollution control may be overestimated currently. In particular, China's NMVOC emissions were shown to have increased by 26.6% from 2015 to 2018, especially over the North China Plain by 38.0%), Northeast China (by 38.3%), and Central China (60.0%). In contrast, the emissions reduction rate of CO may be underestimated. Overall, our emissions inventory sheds new light on the complex variations of air pollutant emissions in China during its two recent clean air action periods, which could significantly improve our understanding of air pollutant emissions and related changes in air quality in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Effectively allocating emission control targets is critical for China to achieve its emission reduction goals. This study researched the efficiency of total carbon dioxide (CO2) emission control target allocations during the 13th Five-Year Plan period (2015–2020). The efficiency of carbon intensity reduction targets, allocated by the National Development and Reform Commission in 30 regions, was assessed using a Directional Distance Function (DDF) model. Then, a Zero-Sum Gains (ZSG)-DDF model was constructed to determine how to optimally allocate total CO2 emission, under the premise of maximizing economic benefits and minimizing CO2 emissions. The results showed that in the case of fixed total CO2 emissions, to improve the resource allocation efficiency, the quota should be increased in the regions with high efficiencies, and the quota should be reduced in the regions with low efficiencies. The results in this paper can help guide the future allocations of total CO2 emission in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the Long-range Energy Alternatives Planning (LEAP) model is constructed to simulate six scenarios for forecasting national electricity demand in China. The results show that in 2020 the total electricity demand will reach 6407.9~7491.0 billion KWh, and will be 6779.9~10,313.5 billion KWh in 2030. Moreover, under the assumption of power production just meeting the social demand and considering the changes in the scale and technical structure of power industry, this paper simulates two scenarios to estimate carbon emissions and carbon intensity till 2030, with 2012 as the baseline year. The results indicate that the emissions intervals are 4074.16~4692.52 million tCO2 in 2020 and 3948.43~5812.28 million tCO2 in 2030, respectively. Carbon intensity is 0.63~0.64 kg CO2/KWh in 2020 and 0.56~0.58 kg CO2/KWh in 2030. In order to accelerate carbon reduction, the future work should focus on making a more stringent criterion on the intensity of industrial power consumption and expanding the proportion of power generation using clean energy, large capacity, and high efficiency units. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rapid growth of passenger vehicles considerably increases greenhouse gas emission and fuel consumption in China. This paper thereby intends to analyze the potentials of the mitigation of energy use and environmental emission in China’s road passenger transportation sector by assessing two available approaches, i.e. biofuel and hybrid vehicle strategies. It was found that biofuel is effective for emission reduction in only three subsubsectors. A synthesis strategy is thereby proposed to meet the state policy goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Docked vessels in ports can be one of the dirtiest emitters in terms of local air pollutants. This paper evaluates whether the regulation of Emission Control Areas in China reduces air pollutants emissions in port cities. The transboundary spillovers of air pollution, induced by meteorological conditions, results in air pollution concentrations at specific locations encompassing both locally generated pollutants and those originating from elsewhere. Therefore, it is challenging to discern the emission reduction effects of environmental regulatory policies through air pollutant monitoring concentrations. This paper develops an approach to isolate transboundary spillovers induced by the wind, estimate locally produced pollution, and utilize the concentrations of locally produced pollution to identify the treatment effects of the Chinese Emission Control Areas policy. The results find that the policy has significantly reduced the locally produced sulfur dioxide concentrations by 3.41% in port cities. However, the omission of transboundary spillovers could yield contrasting results, suggesting that ignoring the pollution transport could lead to erroneous conclusions. The research findings of this study hold significant policy implications, highlighting the importance of accounting for transboundary transport of air pollution in evaluating the local government's environmental efforts and implementing supra-city environmental policies to prevent air pollution. • We investigate the efficacy of marine fuel restrictions policy. • We develop a new approach to account for the transboundary air pollution spillovers. • The policy significantly reduced local sulfur dioxide concentrations in ports. • Ignoring pollutant spillovers may bias the estimate of environmental policy effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the demand of vehicle emission research and control, this paper presents the development of a portable vehicle measurement system (PEMS) based on SEMTECH-DS and ELPI+, the vehicle emission tests carried out on actual roads, and the data obtained for the establishment and validation of a vehicle emission model. Based on the results of the vehicle emission test, it was found that vehicle driving conditions (speed, acceleration, vehicle specific power (VSP), etc.) had a significant impact on the pollutant emission rate. In addition, local driving cycles were generated and the frequency distribution of VSP-bin under different cycles was analyzed. Then, through the establishment of an emission rate database, calculation of emission factors and validation of the emission model, a vehicle emission model based on actual road driving conditions was developed by taking VSP as the "surrogate variables". It showed that the emission factor model established in this study could better reflect the vehicle transient emissions on the actual road with high accuracy and local adaptability. Through this study, it could be found that due to the great differences in traffic development modes and vehicle driving conditions in different cities in China, the emission model based on driving conditions was a better choice to carry out the research on vehicle emission in Chinese cities. Compared with directly applying international models or quoting the recommended values of relevant macroscopic guidelines, the emission factor model established in this study, using actual driving conditions, could better reflect the vehicle transient emissions on the actual road with high accuracy and local adaptability. In addition, due to the rapid development of China's urban traffic and the rapid change of driving conditions, it was of great significance to regularly update China's urban conditions to improve the accuracy of the model, no matter which model was chosen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the author's perspectives on the two papers published in the 2009 issue of the publication "Climatic Change Letters." He notes that the two letters emphasized the great cost involved in strictly adhering to the greenhouse gas mitigation-oriented Byrd-Hagel Resolution from U.S. He discusses the implications of the integrated assessment models used by the papers, in intensifying the commitment of various countries especially China in reducing the emission.

This paper provides an overview of the trend of generation, composition, and management of municipal solid waste, and estimates the carbon emissions arising from municipal solid waste management in Beijing. The correlation analysis conducted shows that the generation of municipal solid waste in Beijing has been growing steadily, showing high correlations ( r > 0.9) to the total GDP, per capita income, and the population. Food waste showed an increasing trend since 1990. Compared with the results of an investigation in 1990, ash and woodchips content in 2003 declined from 56% to 17%, while the percentage of paper and plastic increased from 10% to 29% over the same period. The calorific value of the municipal waste also increased, from 2,686 kJ/kg in 1990 to 4,667 kJ/kg in 2003, indicating that the waste is suitable for incineration. Currently, the source separation ratio of municipal waste is approximately 15%. About 94% of all the collected solid waste goes to the landfill while 4% is composted and 2% is incinerated. A moderate garbage collection fee is applied to both permanent and temporary residents in Beijing, but the willingness to pay for solid waste collection and treatment is still low. Under current treatment mode, the total amounts of carbon emission from waste disposal sites and incineration increased with the increase of municipal solid waste, from 29.8 Gg in 1990 to 84.5 Gg in 2003, including 83.3 Gg of CH4 and 22.0 Gg of CO2. The data availability and methodological challenges in monitoring the quantity and characteristics of municipal solid waste are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of market-based mechanisms is a cost-effective way to reduce carbon emissions. The present paper reviews the global carbon market, focusing mainly on its structure and price features, and analyzes the role of China in the global carbon market. China is playing a leading role in the pursuit of sustainable development, which can account for its lagging behind in the Clean Development Mechanism. The paper discusses the opportunities and challenges for China undertaking the Clean Development Mechanism project in the future. (Edited by Zhinan Zhang) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Atmospheric mercury is a crucial pollutant that must be well‐controlled to avoid damaging public health. It is thus necessary to understand from multiple perspectives the roles played by different industrial sectors, as well as their geographical distribution. Existing studies have overlooked the transmission sectors in the economic supply chains of the embodied atmospheric mercury emission network. In this paper, we offer a betweenness‐based account (BBA) for Chinese regions and industrial sectors in transmitting embodied atmospheric mercury emissions and in doing so have identified the transmitting hubs. Our results show that the Henan province acts as the transmission hub of the embodied atmospheric mercury emission network in China. The metallurgy, chemical, and construction industries generally play important roles in the transmission of embodied atmospheric mercury emissions across China. Henan's metallurgy sector, the third highest of all, is more closely linked with inter‐provincial sectors than the top two transmission sectors (the metallurgy industry of Jiangsu and the chemical industry of Shandong). This study can help policy makers improve mercury control measures by focusing on transmission processes for effective and comprehensive atmospheric mercury emission control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Continual growth of energy-related CO emissions in China has received great attention, both domestically and internationally. In this paper, we evaluated the CO emissions in five major energy consumption sectors which were evaluated from 1991 to 2012. In order to analyze the driving factors of CO emission change in different sectors, the Kaya identity was extended by adding several variables based on specific industrial characteristics and a decomposition analysis model was established according to the LMDI method. The results demonstrated that economic factor was the leading force explaining emission increase in each sector while energy intensity and sector contribution were major contributors to emission mitigation. Meanwhile, CO emission intensity had no significant influence on CO emission in the short term, and energy consumption structure had a small but growing negative impact on the increase of CO emissions. In addition, the future CO emissions of industry from 2013 to 2020 under three scenarios were estimated, and the reduction potential of CO emissions in industry are 335 Mt in 2020 under lower-emission scenario while the CO emission difference between higher-emission scenario and lower-emission scenario is nearly 725 Mt. This paper can offer complementary perspectives on determinants of energy-related CO emission change in different sectors and help to formulate mitigation strategies for CO emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

85% of China's GHG emissions are attributed to urban economic activities, and this share is expected to rise given China's fast urbanization process. This paper provides estimates of city-level industrial CO2 emissions and their growth rates for all 287 Chinese prefecture-level and above cities during the years 1998-2009. We decompose the CO2 emission changes into scale, composition and technique effects. The decomposition results show that these three effects differ significantly across the three tiers of cities in China. The scale effect contributes to rising CO2 emissions, while the technique effect leads to declining CO2 emissions in all cities. The composition effect leads to increasing CO2 emissions in the third-tier cities, while it reduces CO2 emissions in the first and second-tier cities, due to the relocation of energy-intensive industries from the latter to the former type of cities. Based on these decomposition results, we identify the separate channels through which the inflow of FDI and the environmental regulations affect city-level CO2 emissions. The decomposition framework in our paper can help policy makers and scholars to better understand Chinese cities' trade-offs between economic growth and environmental goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change mitigation and adaptation are common global challenges, and how to accelerate carbon neutrality and green recovery is a major global issue. Market-oriented emission reduction policy has been widely concerned for its unique advantages, but most of the current market-oriented emission reduction policies are based on the consideration of end-of-pipe governance and lack of effective control of source reduction. Energy quota trading (EQT) is an innovation of an energy-saving and emission reduction system, which is based on the idea of source reduction. However, it is unknown about the evaluation of the effect of the EQT policy from the macro perspective. Based on the related statistical data of energy consumption, combined with the ARIMA model, STIRPAT model, and the synthetic control method (SCM), this paper analyzes the energy consumption distribution in China from 2001 to 2020 and comprehensively evaluates the effect of EQT in the pilots. The results show that: (1) The overall energy consumption in China shows a steady upward trend, and its distribution is unbalanced. (2) In absolute perspective, EQT can realize the "double control" of the total amount and intensity in energy saving and emission reduction, and the intensity control effect is better than the total amount control effect. (3) In relative perspective, EQT can enhance the potential of energy saving and emission reduction in the pilots, in which it needs to take the regional characteristics into account. The policy effect is still significant when eliminating some unobservable factors, which indicate that the policy is effective and can be replicated nationwide. The study comprehensively evaluates the effect of ETS from multiple perspectives, which can effectively avoid the misjudgment of the policy effectiveness caused by the single dimension evaluation, while it can also be used as a reference for the government to perfect the policies of energy management system and emission control system. Furthermore, the development of EQT is an important catalyst for policymakers to coordinate policies to accelerate the achievement of carbon-neutral targets and a more resilient low-carbon development model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]