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The increased demand for energy in China has generated concomitant increase of carbon emissions, which poses an unprecedented challenge to China's, and even global, sustainable development. In this paper, from the perspective of provincial carbon emissions, we analyze China's carbon emissions changes during 1997-2007 based on the index decomposition analysis method. We find that: (1) China's CO2 emissions from end-use energy consumption mainly originated from such major industrial provinces as Hebei, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shandong, Henan and Guangdong. (2) Economic growth and decline in energy intensity will have the greatest impact on CO2 emissions from end-use energy consumption. Economic growth is the key factor driving the increase of CO2 emissions. Change in energy intensity can more or less decrease CO2 emissions. In the future, China's carbon emissions mitigation policies should be developed to address these differences in provincial carbon emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In steady-state methods for estimating energy consumption of buildings, the commonly used data include the monthly average dry bulb temperatures, the heating and cooling degree-days and the dry bulb temperature bin data. This work presents average values of these data for the 1983-1992 and 1993-2002 decades, calculated for Athens and Thessaloniki, determined from hourly dry bulb temperature records of meteorological stations (National Observatory of Athens and Aristotle University of Thessaloniki). The results show that the monthly average dry bulb temperatures and the annual average cooling degree-days of the 1993-2002 decade are increased, compared to those of the 1983-1992 decade, while the corresponding annual average heating degree-days are reduced. Also, the low temperature bins frequency results decreased in the 1993-2002 decade while the high temperature ones increased, compared to the 1983-1992 decade. The effect of temperature data variations on the energy consumption and on CO2 emissions of buildings was examined by calculating the energy demands for heating and cooling and the CO2 emissions from diesel-oil and electricity use of a typical residential building-model. From the study it is concluded that the heating energy requirements during the decade 1993-2002 were decreased, as compared to the energy demands of the decade 1983-1992, while the cooling energy requirements were increased. The variations of CO2 emissions from diesel oil and electricity use were analog to the energy requirements alterations. The results indicate a warming trend, at least for the two regions examined, which affect the estimation of heating and cooling demands of buildings. It, therefore, seems obvious that periodic adaptation of the temperature data used for building energy studies is required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]