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This paper systematically describes the technical principles, evaluation indicators, system forms and research progress of air-side evaporative cooling air conditioning systems, water-side evaporative cooling air conditioning systems and freon-side evaporative cold coagulation heat air conditioning systems of Data center. In order to reduce the energy consumption of the refrigeration and air-conditioning system in the Data center, the application conditions and scenarios of the different forms of evaporative cooling air-conditioning systems should be considered comprehensively. Therefore, it is very important that the renewable energy-dry air can be used to the greatest extent. These efforts would contribute to China's 2030 "Carbon Peak" and 2060 "Carbon Neutral."

Clean and renewable energy plays important role in achieving carbon neutrality and nature sustainability, especially the application of green hydrogen in new energy system. Hydrogen (H2) produced from visible light has attracted attention owing to its high conversion efficiency and cleaner process. In this review, different photocatalyst preparation methods which can directly design the same structure were clarified. Also, different mechanism design which can realize different electron transfers were also proposed. Thus, various morphologies and different mechanisms of electron transfer have been summarized and evaluated. Also, the methods of photocatalysts’ construction were mentioned, all H2 production reactions depend on the amount of reaction sites and photo-generate electrons. It was evident that the concentration of reaction sites and photo-generate electrons play important roles in efficient H2 production. This review provides fundamental knowledge to design and construct variable morphologies with different electron transfer processes to enhance efficiency of H2 production.

As environmental crises such as global warming become more and more serious due to the large amount of carbon dioxide emitted by the burning of fossil fuels, much attention has been paid to carbon neutrality. Hydrogen, with zero carbon content, is a clean and renewable energy carrier having a large energy density. It is considered as one of the most desirable alternatives to fossil fuels. Electrochemical water splitting, unlike the steam reforming process accelerating fossil fuels depletion and CO2 emissions, can produce H2 powered by renewable energy such as solar or wind. As a promising way to promote carbon neutralization, hydrogen production by electrolysis of water is meaningful both in terms of scientific research and practical application. In order to drive electrochemical water splitting with low power consumption, efficient, durable and affordable electrocatalysts with low overpotentials are in urgent need. Therefore, this mini-review briefly introduces the current development status and mainstream obstacles of carbon-based materials used in electrochemical water splitting.

China’s energy system requires a thorough transformation to achieve carbon neutrality. Here, leveraging the highly acclaimed The Integrated MARKAL-EFOM System model of China (China TIMES) that takes energy, the environment, and the economy into consideration, four carbon-neutral scenarios are proposed and compared for different emission peak times and carbon emissions in 2050. The results show that China’s carbon emissions will peak at 10.3–10.4 Gt between 2025 and 2030. In 2050, renewables will account for 60% of total energy consumption (calorific value calculation) and 90% of total electricity generation, and the electrification rate will be close to 60%. The energy transition will bring sustained air quality improvement, with an 85% reduction in local air pollutants in 2050 compared with 2020 levels, and an early emission peak will yield more near-term benefits. Early peak attainment requires the extensive deployment of renewables over the next decade and an accelerated phasing out of coal after 2025. However, it will bring benefits such as obtaining better air quality sooner, reducing cumulative CO2 emissions, and buying more time for other sectors to transition. The pressure for more ambitious emission reductions in 2050 can be transmitted to the near future, affecting renewable energy development, energy service demand, and welfare losses.

Renewable energy generation, as part of the global effort to mitigate climate change, will play a central role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and achieving China’s goal of carbon emissions peak before 2030 and carbon neutral before 2060. However, the impact of carbon quota auctions on renewable energy generation has not been sufficiently discussed. The main purpose of this study is to investigate whether China can rely on quota auctions to increase renewable energy generation in the short term, and to demonstrate which is more effective in promoting renewable energy development, policy enforcement or auction constraints? The improved neo-trans-log production model, the multi-objective linear programming model and the dispatch heuristic were used to predict additional emission reduction cost, optimized power mix with different auctioning rates, with economic development, technological progress and the unique characteristics of China's power generation industry being taken into consideration. The results show that the auctioning rate will have little influence on the optimized energy production structure, especially on the share of renewable energy resources; when the total on-grid electricity generation ranges from 7625‒7926 billion kW h and the auctioning rate ranges from 0%‒5%, policy enforcement will influence the generation of renewable energy to a greater extent than auctioning in the near future.

China’s recently announced directive on tackling climate change, namely, to reach carbon peak by 2030 and to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060, has led to an unprecedented nationwide response among the academia and industry. Under such a directive, a rapid increase in the grid penetration rate of solar in the near future can be fully anticipated. Although solar radiation is an atmospheric process, its utilization, as to produce electricity, has hitherto been handled by engineers. In that, it is thought important to bridge the two fields, atmospheric sciences and solar engineering, for the common good of carbon neutrality. In this überreview, all major aspects pertaining to solar resource assessment and forecasting are discussed in brief. Given the size of the topic at hand, instead of presenting technical details, which would be overly lengthy and repetitive, the overarching goal of this review is to comprehensively compile a catalog of some recent, and some not so recent, review papers, so that the interested readers can explore the details on their own.

Hydrogen as a low-carbon clean energy source is experiencing a global resurgence and has been recognized as an alternative energy carrier that can help bring the world to a carbon neutral future. However, getting to scale is one of the main challenges limiting the growth of the hydrogen economy. In particular, the high cost of transporting green hydrogen is bottlenecking the international trading and wider adoption of hydrogen for global carbon natural objectives. In order to explore incentives for the global hydrogen economy and develop new pathways towards the carbon neutral future, the concept of hydrogen credit is proposed by this research and a framework of trading hydrogen credits similar to carbon credits in the international market is established. This research aims to contribute to the overall uptake of green hydrogen financially rather than relying on the physical production, transportation, and storage of hydrogen. Case studies are presented to demonstrate the feasibility and efficiency of the proposed hydrogen credit framework, as well as the great potential of a global hydrogen credit market.

Thermoelectric generators (TEGs) have the potential to contribute significantly to the realization of a carbon-neutral society by recovering electrical energy from various types of waste heat. Potential applications include wireless sensors, automobiles, and wearable devices. Despite their promise, however, TEGs have not been widely diffused due to their currently high cost and low energy conversion efficiency. This article aims to design technology diffusion roadmaps in order to clarify the gap between market needs and technological development, and discusses ways to bridge this gap. Drawing on the backcasting-based roadmap design method developed previously by the authors, TEG roadmaps were prototyped using online interviews with two companies that are developing and marketing their own TEGs for specific applications. Based on the responses, a roadmap design process consisting of five steps—problem setting, preparation, information gathering, structuring and analyzing the results, and feedback—was developed. To demonstrate the proposed method, a case study in which various digital platforms and tools were utilized to efficiently exploit the knowledge and opinions of participating experts was conducted online. Results revealed a pathway by which TEGs could be effectively diffused to meet both social and market needs over the next 30 years. Internet of Things sensors and automobiles were identified as promising applications for the near term, while, for the longer term, the need to develop new solutions and surrounding technologies in order to expand future demand for TEGs was made evident.

The energy transition which refers to shift of the energy system from fossil-based resources to renewable and sustainable energy sources becomes a global issue to mitigate the progression of climate change. Hydrogen can play an important role in long-term decarbonization of energy system and achievement of carbon neutrality. Currently, the utilization of hydrogen in the energy system is focused on a road transportation sector as a fuel in a vehicle fleet. Compressing gaseous hydrogen is the most well-established technology for storage in hydrogen-fueled vehicles. The refueling hydrogen requires short filling time while ensuring the safety of storage tanks in a vehicle. However, a fast filling of hydrogen in high pressure leads to a rapid temperature rise of hydrogen stored in tank. Therefore, many numerical and experimental studies have been carried out to analyze the filling process. Various thermo-physical properties of gaseous hydrogen such as density, viscosity, and thermal conductivity are required for the numerical studies and the accurate hydrogen properties are essential to obtain reliable results. In this work, a polynomial equation is proposed with respect to temperature and pressure in ranges of 223.15 K Results of the study can provide accurate and reliable hydrogen property values in a fast and robust means specifically for simulation of hydrogen refueling process, but not restricted only to the process. Correlation equations proposed in the present work can aid in optimizing a hydrogen value chain including production, storage, and utilization by providing accurate hydrogen property.

The growing importance of sustainability of operations and declaration by energy organizations (eg: oil companies) to move in the direction of net zero and carbon neutral have put the focus on the enhanced oil recovery techniques that they employ. An enhanced oil recovery technique that is driven by the composition of injected water has been gaining focus due to its relatively lower capital and carbon intensity. To make effective decisions on the selected oil recovery method it is essential to analyze the rock, brine, oil, injected water and their complex multiscale interactions. This work does a meta-analysis of different mechanisms and data leading to the development of an expert system workflow. This expert system will enable an all inclusive screening that will ensure efficient decision making and implementation of this low carbon intensity oil recovery and hence energy production systems.

China has promised to reach the peak carbon dioxide emission (ca. 10 billion tons) by 2030 and carbon neutrality by 2060. To realize these goals, it is necessary to develop hydrogen energy and fuel cell techniques. However, the high cost and low intrinsic safety of high-pressure hydrogen storage limit their commercialization. NH3 is high in hydrogen content, easily liquefied at low pressure, and free of carbon, and the technology of NH3 synthesis has been commercialized nationwide. It is worth noting that the production of NH3 in China is about 56 million tons per year, accounting for 35% of worldwide production. Hence, with the well established infrastructure for NH3 synthesis and transportation and the demand for clean energy in China, it is feasible to develop a green and economical energy roadmap, viz., “Clean low-pressure NH3 synthesis → Safe and economical NH3 storage and transportation → Carbon-free efficient NH3-H2 utilization”, for low-carbon or even carbon-free energy production. Currently, the academic and industrial communities in China are striving to make technological breakthroughs in areas such as photocatalytic water splitting, electrocatalytic water splitting, mild-condition NH3 synthesis, low-temperature NH3 catalytic decomposition, and indirect or direct NH3 fuel cells, with significant progress. Taking full advantage of the NH3 synthesis industry and readjusting the industrial structure, it is viable to achieve energy saving and emission reduction in NH3 synthesis industry (440 million tons CO2 per year), as well as promote a new energy industry and ensure national energy security. Therefore, relevant academic and industrial communities should put effort on mastering the key technologies of “Ammonia-Hydrogen” energy conversion and utilization with complete self-dependent intellectual property. It is envisioned that through the establishment of “Renewable Energy-Ammonia-Hydrogen” circular economy, a green technology chain for hydrogen energy industry would pose as a promising pathway to achieve the 2030 and 2060 goals.

China has set ambitious goals to peak carbon emissions by 2030 and to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060, which will inevitably accelerate the transition from conventional fossil energy to new energy. However, the financing problem may be a major concern for the development of new energy. In this study, by employing the asymmetric spillover measurement, the financing performance of new energy stock market in China is investigated. Specifically, 5-minute intraday high-frequency data of 66 listed firms, selected to represent the field, are used. The new energy stocks are also divided into six categories, including photovoltaic power, nuclear power, new energy vehicles, lithium batteries, wind power, and new energy equipment and materials. The results suggest that the new energy stock market in China is much riskier than the large cap stock market. The investors in this stock market are sensitive to negative news and tend to be speculative in short-term, rather than to focus on the development of new energy sector in the long run. Policy implications and suggestions are thereupon derived for different types of stakeholders.

Climate change has become a global non-traditional security challenge.There is a long way to go for China's energy structure to go through a green and low-carbon transition.As the key to “peak carbon emissions and achieve carbon neutrality”, the energy industry should have a comprehensive understanding of the general trend of the world’s energy transition and be fully aware of China’s resource endowment which is “enriched coal, insufficient oil and gas, and abundant new energy”.It should firmly adhere to energy saving and efficiency improvement, insist on supply and demand coordination, strengthen the top-level design, implement energy saving projects, decarbonization projects, innovation projects, efficiency improvement projects, emergency response projects and support projects.Efforts should also be given to the acceleration of energy consumption structure transformation from coal-oriented (with oil, gas and new energy accounting for less than 20% respectively while coal over 50%) to new-energy-oriented ( with coal, oil and gas accounting for less than 20% respectively while new energy over 50%). Speed up the construction of a clean, lowcarbon, safe and efficient smart energy system.

To achieve the goals of emission peak and carbon neutrality, significant effort is invested to accelerate the energy transition, with a focus on the development and utilization of renewable energy, as well as the upgrading of conventional units. Within this context, this paper proposes an innovative concept, known as the integrated energy production unit (IEPU), providing a variety of energy products and flexible adjustment functions for power systems with high penetration of non-hydro renewable energy. In the IEPU framework, a photovoltaic (PV) power plant is installed to produce electricity; CO 2 capture technology is applied to the existing coal-fired power plant with biomass co-combustion. The generated CO 2 is used to synthesize methane or methanol with hydrogen through electrolysis. First, the operational principle and advantages of this concept are illustrated. Then, a simplified model is built to provide an optimal configuration scheme of equipment capacity. Finally, the potential contribution of IEPU to the operational flexibility of the power system is also analyzed.

Economic growth largely requires the support of growth in energy consumption and has also caused many carbon emissions. China is one of the few energy producers and consumers dominated by coal in the world. The rebound in coal energy efficiency will affect the country’s energy security and carbon neutrality by 2060. Therefore, this article initially defines the energy efficiency rebound effect of the coal industry and compares the rebound effect coefficient (REC) at the coal industry level and the enterprise (YK Group) level. The study found that energy intensity at the macro and micro levels has been downward, but with a rebound effect; at the industry level, the REC in the last 20 years was 30.27%, while at the enterprise level is 3.03%. The main reason for the huge gap is the difference in energy consumption statistics at different levels. Finally, this article proposes that coal consumption as raw material should not be defined as ”energy consumption” at the enterprise level. It gives suggestions for energy efficiency improvement at the enterprise level according to the practice.

Left unmitigated, climate change poses a catastrophic risk to human health, demanding an urgent and concerted response from every country. The 2015 Lancet Commission on Health and Climate Change and The Lancet Countdown: Tracking Progress on Health and Climate Change have been initiated to map out the impacts of climate change and the necessary policy responses. To meet these challenges, Tsinghua University, partnering with the University College London and 17 Chinese and international institutions, has prepared the Chinese Lancet Countdown report, which has a national focus and builds on the work of the global Lancet Countdown: Tracking Progress on Health and Climate Change. Drawing on international methodologies and frameworks, this report aims to deepen the understanding of the links between public health and climate change at the national level and track them with 23 indicators. This work is part of the Lancet's Countdown broader efforts to develop regional expertise on this topic, and coincides with the launch of the Lancet Countdown Regional Centre in Asia, based at Tsinghua University. The data and results of this report are presented at the provincial level, where possible, to facilitate targeted response strategies for local decision-makers. Based on the data and findings of the 2020 Chinese Lancet Countdown report, five recommendations are proposed to key stakeholders in health and climate change in China: (1) Enhance inter-departmental cooperation. Climate change is a challenge that demands an integrated response from all sectors, urgently requiring substantial inter-departmental cooperation among health, environment, energy, economic, financial, and education authorities. (2) Strengthen health emergency preparedness. Knowledge and findings on current and future climate-related health threats still lack the required attention and should be fully integrated into the emergency preparedness and response system. (3) Support research and raise awareness. Additional financial support should be allocated to health and climate change research in China to enhance health system adaptation, mitigation measures, and their health benefits. At the same time, media and academia should be fully motivated to raise the public and politicians' awareness of this topic. (4) Increase climate change mitigation. Speeding up the phasing out of coal is necessary to be consistent with China's pledge to be carbon neutral by 2060 and to continue to reduce air pollution. Fossil fuel subsidies must also be phased out. (5) Ensure the recovery from COVID-19 to protect health now and in the future. China's efforts to recover from COVID-19 will shape public health for years to come. Climate change should be a priority in these interventions.

By the end of 2020, most countries in the world have successively proposed carbon-neutral targets. Among them, the major economies in the world, such as the United States (USA), the European Union, Japan, and Canada, have proposed to achieve carbon-neutral targets by 2050. As the world’s largest carbon emitter, China has a total carbon emissions of more than 11.3 billion tons, accounting for about 30% of global carbon emissions. Therefore, the carbon emission reduction required for China is much higher than that of other economies, and its carbon-neutral tasks are obviously more complex and diversified. On 22 September 2020, the Chinese government announced in the 75th Session of the UN (United Nations) General Assembly (New York, USA) that China aims to achieve carbon neutrality before 2060. The announcement of the carbon-neutral target clearly indicated that China needs to carry out a self-revolution to achieve zero CO2 emissions before 2060. The concept of carbon neutrality is essentially a balance between carbon sources and carbon sinks. The carbon source is the process of releasing CO2 into the atmosphere, and the carbon sink is the process of absorbing CO2 from the atmosphere. Investigating the atmospheric system within a certain period, when the amount of CO2 emitted by all carbon sources into the system is equal to the amount of CO2 absorbed by all carbon sinks from the system, carbon neutrality can be achieved. There are various carbon sources and sinks in nature with complicated relationships. Among them, the most important carbon source related to human activities is energy production. In 2020, China’s power sector emitted about 4 billion tons of CO2 per year, which is close to 40% of the total emissions. Thus, the power sector is one of the key areas in emission reduction to achieve the carbon-neutral goal. Building a carbon-neutral power system is the only way to achieve decarbonization in the energy sector. Based on the carbon balance principle, this paper proposed the critical equation of carbon neutrality for power systems. And the further strategies in establishing a carbon-neutral power system were explored according to the carbon neutrality equation: (1) Improve energy efficiency thus reducing the consumption of carbonaceous energy; (2) adjust the energy structure and reduce the proportion of carbonaceous energy; (3) rebuild the balance of sources and sinks by adopting CO2 capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) technology to achieve low-carbon utilization of carbonaceous energy. Results indicate that, although improving energy efficiency of carbonaceous energy is effective in CO2 mitigation, it is limited by the declining energy saving potential of thermal power plants to be the main technical way in carbon emission reduction. Besides, increasing the proportion of renewable energy can quickly reduce the carbon emission intensity of the power system, which is currently the main technical way to reduce the CO2 emission of the power system. However, although energy conservation and the development of renewable energy can reduce the carbon emission intensity of the power system, the CCUS technology and the negative emission technology will be indispensable to achieve the goal of carbon neutrality. And the large-scale promotion of the CCUS technology must overcome technical obstacles of the rather high energy consumption of CO2 capture. Thus, building a carbon-neutral power system in the future requires a combination of energy efficiency, renewable energy and CCUS technology.

Variable Renewable Energy (VRE), i.e., wind and solar photovoltaics (PVs), is being installed in rapidly increasing amounts around the world. Growth in VRE is being spurred by ambitious zero-carbon targets set by countries and individual states across the globe. The European Union approved a carbon neutrality target for 2050 in 2019. Japan’s newly appointed prime minister announced the same target in 2020, and the Chinese government set goals to peak carbon emissions before 2030 and become carbon neutral by 2060.

Renewable energy planning, electrochemical storages, and prosumer-based energy management and sharing in smart grids are critical elements for the transition towards carbon neutrality, whereas the synergistic effects between distributed renewables and storages have not been sufficiently investigated regarding spatiotemporal compensation between energy supply and demand. Moreover, the economic benefits of individual prosumers need to be quantified to motivate their participation in the sharing scheme. In this study, a peer-to-peer (P2P) energy sharing paradigm was formulated, consisting of hybrid solar-wind renewable systems, battery storages, grid-connected commercial prosumers (a high-rise office building and a high-rise hotel), and flexible energy management. Different sharing scenarios with/without storage sharing were studied for performance improvements. Case studies show that, compared to the traditional peer-to-grid operation, the proposed P2P sharing operation with storage sharing can promote the self-consumption from 0.591 to 0.795 and reduce the net cost from 80.4 to 52.7 HKD/m2·a by 34.5%. The formulated energy sharing strategies can also contribute to energy bill savings for each prosumer when considering the profit from transactive energy and grid feed-in tariff, whereas the storage sharing may shorten the battery service life. The research can provide synergistic sharing strategies, energy planning, and economic policy guidelines to achieve carbon-neutral communities.

In recent years, China has been promoting the process of carbon neutral by establishing carbon exchanges (CEs) and implementing relevant carbon emission reward and punishment policies. This study proposes a partnership of the CE, solar power plant (SPP) and coal-fired thermal power plant (TPP). Based on the tripartite evolutionary game model and current policies of China, the evolutionary processes are simulated and discussed. The results reveal that stable states can be achieved under different partnership modes. Effect evaluation results of typical parameters on the three participants show that on the premise of ensuring the participations of CE and SPP, properly reducing the prices of carbon emission share sold to the TPP will strengthen the participation willingness of TPP. The relatively reasonable selling price ranges of carbon emission share of the CE and SPP sold to the TPP are 6.0 ∼ 6.2 $/t and 5.3 ∼ 5.5 $/t, respectively. Higher zero carbon emission reward and higher carbon tax can strengthen the participation willingness of TPP and make the TPP achieve the carbon neutral. This study can provide a reference for the government and related industries to promote the carbon neutral development as well as the coordinated development of solar power and coal-fired thermal power.

In order to effectively respond to the global climate change and energy crisis, the structural transformation of energy has become an irreversible trend in the future development of China’s energy system. As a new kind of clean and renewable energy source, wind power technology has made great progress in recent years and has become relatively mature. The penetration rate of wind power in China’s power system increases continuously, playing an important role in promoting energy saving and emission reduction. However, because of their instability in time and space, wind power and solar power may pose great challenges to the safety of the power grid. To ensure power supply, thermal power generating units, combined with pumped-storage power stations, are still mainly used for peak load regulation nowadays, which is inconsistent with the long-term goal of carbon neutrality. This essay mainly studies the feasibility of turning hydropower stations into power regulation centers, taking the Three Gorges Project as the analysis object.

Economic expansion gives rise to modern and energy-efficient technologies and, thus, contributes to a decline in energy usage. Developing countries, including Pakistan, require tremendous efforts to sustain economic growth. However, to attain economic growth, these countries have to cope with greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and other environmental problems. This research focuses primarily on the asymmetric impacts of energy consumption and economic growth on Pakistan's environmental quality. Accordingly, secondary data spanning from 1971 to 2018 was used, and carbon dioxide emission (CO2) was considered a target variable (a proxy for environmental quality), whereas energy consumption (E) and gross domestic product (GDP) as a proxy for economic growth, and trade accessibility (TR) and foreign direct investment (FDI) as control variables. The nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) approach is used to verify the asymmetric co-integration between the variables selected. Moreover, to examine data stationarity and nonlinearity, we used the Zivot-Andrews structural break unit root and BDS tests, respectively. The findings confirmed the asymmetric and symmetric co-integrations among the considered variables. In addition, the causality analysis reveals that only negative shocks to TR have an effect on CO2 emissions. Similarly, negative shocks to FDI asymmetrically cause CO2 emissions. Meanwhile, GDP symmetrically affects CO2 emissions. Finally, a neutral causal response was observed between E and CO2 emissions. These findings have policy implications in terms of environmental management and carbon neutrality, and they serve as a baseline for future research.

The district heating (DH) tariffs depend on many factors, including fuel prices, operational parameters, taxes, investments, and other criteria. The range of tariff values is substantial: sometimes, the difference is more than two times. An analysis of the DH tariffs has been implemented to motivate DH enterprises towards energy efficiency and climate neutrality. Integration of energy efficiency measures in DH systems is proposed by using benchmarking approach after the ranging of criteria that have the most significant effect on DH tariffs. The comparison of different heat tariff benchmarking shows different results in terms of those DH systems, which need to reduce heat tariff, and those that are allowed to increase the heat tariff level. However, the multilinear regression and empirical methods do not indicate stimulation for the energy efficiency increase of DH systems. The reference benchmark method shows that the highest reference tariff is for fossil fuel CHP systems, which would not motivate these systems to become carbon neutral. In the proposed Climate index benchmark method, the allowed heat tariff is related to the existing tariff and determined Climate index value. The allowed heat tariff increase would be higher for those systems with better energy efficiency and RES share indicators.

Global climate change caused by geological processes is one of the main causes of the 5 global mass extinctions in geological history. Human industrialization activities have caused serious damage to the ecosystem, the greenhouse effect of atmospheric CO2 has intensified, and the living environment is facing threats and challenges. Carbon neutrality is the active action and common goal of mankind in the face of the climate change crisis, therefore, probing into its theoretical and technological connotation, scientific and technological innovation system has far-reaching significance and broad prospects. Studies indicate that (1) Carbon neutrality reflects the theoretical connotations of “energy science” and “carbon neutrality science”, including technical connotations of carbon emission reduction, zero carbon emission, negative carbon emission, and carbon trading. (2) Carbon neutrality spawns new industries such as carbon industry centering on CO2 capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS, or CO2 capture and storage CCS), and hydrogen industry centering on green hydrogen. “Gray carbon” and “black carbon” are the two application attributes of CO2. “Carbon+”, “Carbon−”, and “Carbon=” are three carbon-neutral products and technologies. (3) China faces three major challenges in achieving the goal of carbon neutrality: first, energy transition is large in scale and the cycle is short; Second, there are many problems in the process of energy transition, such as security uncertainties, economic utilization, and unpredictable disruptive technologies; Third, after transition, we may face new key techno-logical “bottlenecks” and “broken chain” of key mineral resources. (4) Based on current knowledge to predict the top 10 disruptive technologies and industries in the energy field: underground coal gasification, in-situ conversion process of medium and low-mature shale oil, CCUS/CCS, hydrogen energy and fuel cells, bio-photovoltaic power generation, space-based solar power generation, optical storage smart micro-grid, super energy storage, controllable nuclear fusion, wisdom energy Internet. Five strategic projects will be implemented, including energy conservation and efficiency improvement, carbon reduction and sequestration, scientific and technological innovation, emergency reserve and policy support. (5) In the future, different types of energy will have different orientations. Coal will play the role of ensuring the national energy strategy “reserve” and “guarantee the bottom line”. Petroleum will play the role of ensuring national energy security “urgent need” and the “cornerstone” of raw materials in people's livelihood. Natural gas will play the role in ensuring national energy “safety” and “best partner” of new energy. New energy will play the role in ensuring the “replacement” and “main force” of the national energy strategy. (6) Carbon neutrality is a major practice of the green industrial revolution, carbon reduction energy revolution, and ecological technology revolution, which will bring new and profound changes to human society, the environment and the economy. (7) Carbon neutrality needs to follow the four principles of “disruptive breakthroughs in technology, guarantee of energy security, realization of economic feasibility, and controllable social stability”. We should rely on technological innovation and management changes to ensure the realization of national energy “independence” and carbon neutrality goal, and make China's contribution to the construction of a livable earth, green development, and ecological civilization.

Summary China, the largest global CO2 emitter, recently announced ambitious targets for carbon neutrality by 2060. Its technical and economic feasibility is unclear given severe renewable integration barriers. Here, we developed a cross-sector, high-resolution assessment model to quantify optimal energy structures on provincial bases for different years. Hourly power system simulations for all provinces for a full year are incorporated on the basis of comprehensive grid data to quantify the renewable balancing costs. Results indicate that the conventional strategy of employing local wind, solar, and storage to realize 80% renewable penetration by 2050 would incur a formidable decarbonization cost of $27/ton despite lower levelized costs for renewables. Coordinated deployment of renewables, ultra-high-voltage transmissions, storages, Power-to-gas and slow-charging electric vehicles can reduce this carbon abatement cost to as low as $−25/ton. Were remaining emissions removed by carbon capture and sequestration technologies, achieving carbon neutrality could be not only feasible but also cost-competitive post 2050.

With the rapid development of society and industry, novel technologies and materials related to pavement engineering are constantly emerging. However, with the continuous improvement of people’s demands, pavement engineering also faces more and more enormous challenges that the pavement materials must have excellent engineering properties and environmental benefits. Meanwhile, the intelligence is the mainstream development direction of modern society, and the development trend of future transportation infrastructure. Materials Genome Initiative, a program for the development of new materials that materials design is conducted by up-front simulations and predictions, followed by key validation experiments, the rapid development of science and technology and AI toolset (big data and machine learning) provide new opportunities and strong technical supports for pavement materials development that shorten the development-application cycle of new material, reduce cost and promote the application of new carriers such as intelligent sensing components in transportation engineering, to achieve the intelligence of transportation engineering. However, traditional pavement materials possess several unavoidable shortcomings, indicating that it is exceedingly difficult for them to meet the above requirements for future pavement materials. Therefore, the development of future new pavement materials, which can be designed on-demand as well as possessing enough mechanical properties, high durability, practical functionality, and high environmental protection, is urgent. In recent years, as a “designable” polymer material with various excellent engineering performances, polyurethane (PU) has been widely applied in pavement practices by changing the chemical structures of raw materials and their mix proportions, for instance pavement repairing material, permeable pavement material, tunnel paving material and bridge deck paving materials, etc. Although PU material has been widely applied in practices, a systematically summarization is still quite necessary for further understanding the working mechanism of PU materials and optimization it’s engineering applications. To fill the gap, this article puts forward the special requirements for future transportation infrastructure materials, and introduces the basic properties and working mechanism of PU materials in order to make up for the defects of conventional road materials. Based on this, this article also summarizes the engineering performances and environmental benefits of applying PU as the binder for different road infrastructure materials in recent years. Considering the gene-editable nature of polyurethane, further research of the on-demand design principles of PU pavement materials is recommended. The establishment of raw material gene database, material terminal performance database and their structure-activity relationship are highlighted. The current research is essential to the practice guidance and further optimization of the PU materials for road infrastructures, which in line with the future Carbon neutral policy.

Nearly-zero energy buildings (NZEB) would effectively improve building energy efficiency and promote building electrification. By using a carbon emission model integrated into a bottom-up mid-to-long term energy consumption model, this study analyzes the contribution of NZEB standards to carbon emission targets in the urban area of China by 2060. Three scenarios are set, namely BAU, steady development (S1), and high-speed development (S2). For BAU, the total carbon emissions will reach a peak of 1.94 Gt CO2 by 2040. In S1 scenario, total building carbon emissions will reach the peak of 1.72 Gt CO2 by 2030. In S2 scenario, the carbon emissions will reach a peak by 2025 with 1.64 Gt CO2. Under S1 scenario, which features consistency with NZEB market development and periodic improvement of building energy-efficiency standards, the carbon emission peak in 2030 will be accomplished. To achieve carbon neutrality by 2060, the upgrading of building energy standards to NZEB will contribute 50.1%, while zero-carbon electricity contribution is 49.9%. It is concluded that 2025, 2030, and 2035 could be set as mandatory enforcement years for ultra-low energy buildings, NZEB and zero energy building (ZEB), respectively.

A carbon cycle model based environmental optimization method is proposed that minimizes the maximum and steady state atmospheric CO2 concentration. The proposed method is applied to a fossil to biomass energy transition problem. The optimization results indicate that a gradual change is more effective than immediate or delayed step changes, and that afforestation is essential in addition to reforestation. From these results, it is suggested that, in order to avoid a huge carbon debt, fossil fuels should be used as a complement until biomass resources are increased to an optimum level by afforestation. Furthermore, it is predicted that using biomass instead of fossils cannot fully recover the initial state, even if supported by intensive afforestation. The misleading concept of carbon neutrality of biomass is also clarified using the proposed model, which shows that biomass is not a preferable alternative to fossil fuels. Nonetheless, the proposed method is applicable to optimal energy utilization of fossil and biomass resources.

With increasing global pressure on transition to carbon neutrality, various technical and policy efforts such as emission trading scheme and carbon tax are being made to improve energy productivity. Yet, there are not many literatures that analyze determinants of firm-level energy productivity, which is an important issue as energy use in industry accounts for one fourth of global carbon emission. This study investigates factors affecting energy productivity such as technology innovation, environmental policy and energy price based on firm-level data from the Korean Emission Trading Scheme (KETS). The total factor energy productivity is estimated by industry based on stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) and panel data analysis is performed to identify determinants of firm-level energy productivity. The results show that energy productivity in Korea has been improved since 2016, and technical progress and environmental policy play an important role in promoting energy productivity. In addition, analysis identifying industry-specific characteristics is performed as their production process and energy consumptions structures vary. The result shows that innovation activity does not significantly affect energy productivity in process industries, but it does in the assembling and high technology industries. This paper implies that policy design reflecting industry-specific characteristics is important to improve energy efficiency more effectively.

Full exploitation of solar photovoltaic electricity generation potential is being pegged back by land availability and the imbalance between demand and generation capacity. In the present work, a land-use-constrained generation model is proposed to identify natural pathways for energy flows within a politically administered region so as to evolve a sustainable nexus between electricity generation and consumption in a decentralized power generation scenario. The model envisages district-level coordination of electricity generation on barren rocky waste land and state-level coordination of distribution. Application of the model to five south Indian states, individually and together, demonstrates how the model is able to account for intra- and interstate disparities in electricity consumption and photovoltaic electricity generation potential. Two of these states can go completely renewable by using all available barren rocky area for electricity generation while the other three will have to rely on as yet untapped off-shore wind power and nuclear power to move towards carbon neutrality in power generation. When considered together, almost all the day time electrical energy demand of all the states can be met by utilizing barren rocky waste land for harnessing solar energy, thus saving considerably on storage losses.

Increasing household energy consumption, mainly due to consumption upgrading, will create tough challenges for China if that country is to achieve peak carbon emissions in 2030 and carbon neutrality in 2060. However, this critical issue has not been explored comprehensively in the literature. Using China Family Panel Studies data and the distribution dynamics approach, this article is the first study to examine the relationship between quality of life (QOL) (proxied by consumption upgrading) and relative household energy consumption (RHEC). The results show that convergence clubs exist in all QOL groups for the RHEC, but they are more evident in the groups with lower middle and low QOL. This is encouraging because they suggest that an improvement in QOL does not necessarily lead to a higher level of energy consumption. The dataset was then divided into rural-urban and regional subgroups to further explore the impacts of these different characteristics on energy consumption. Significant disparities are found among the same QOL groups between urban and rural households and among different regions. The results derived from this study lead to pragmatic policy suggestions in areas including energy saving, emissions reduction, and particularly alleviation of inequality.

Countries around the world are setting ambitious goals to achieve carbon neutrality by the mid-21st century. Most plans involve the integration of massive renewable energy resources into the electricity grid. In addition to the large wind and solar farms at the bulk power grid level, there is an increasing number of grid-edge distributed energy resources (DERs) in the queue of installation. Therefore, the role of electricity end users is shifting from passive consumers, who can only purchase electricity, to active prosumers, who can both produce and consume electricity.

With the global awareness of climate change and environmental problems, major powers over the world have set their goals to contribute to a low-carbon society. China announced the target of "carbon peak and carbon neutrality," requiring a cleaner, carbonfree, economic, and sustainable energy system. To this end, there are two promising approaches. The first is to increase the penetration of clean energies, such as wind power and photovoltaics (PVs). This can reduce carbon emissions effectively. In recent years, China has seen an upsurge in renewable energies, where the installed capacity of new energy generation is more than 388 GW, ranked first in the world for many years. The second approach is to develop integrated energy systems (IESs), which consist of multiple energy carriers, such as fuel cells, electric boilers, combined cooling, heating, and power plants, wind generators, and PVs and energy storage devices. IESs can leverage synergetic effects across multiple energy carriers, such as cascaded utilization of waste heat during electricity generation, and thus achieve higher overall efficiency. An IES is sometimes called the Energy Internet in China and has gained increasing attention during the past few years. In short, the traditional power system is undergoing a transition to IESs with a high penetration of renewable energies.

Summary Climate action pledges have increasingly taken the form of commitments to net carbon neutrality. Higher education institutions (HEIs) are uniquely positioned to innovate in this area, and over 800 United States (U.S.) colleges and universities have pledged to achieve net carbon neutrality. We examine the approaches of 11 U.S. HEIs that have already announced achieving net carbon neutrality, highlighting risks associated with treating carbon offsets, unbundled renewable energy certificates, and bioenergy (collectively 77% of reductions across institutions) as best practice under current frameworks. While pursuing neutrality has led to important institutional shifts toward sustainability, the initial mix of approaches used by these HEIs appears out of alignment with a broader U.S. decarbonization roadmap; in aggregate, these early neutrality efforts underutilize electrification and new zero-carbon electricity. We conclude by envisioning how HEIs (and others) can refocus climate mitigation efforts toward decarbonization and actions that will help shift policy and markets at larger scales.

Improving the efficiency of energy utilization is a necessary way to control the total amount of fossil energy and thus, achieve the goal of carbon peaking by 2030 and carbon neutrality by 2060. Thermal power generation accounts for nearly 50% of the total installed power generation capacity. The optimization of energy savings of existing thermal power-generating units under full working conditions has a key role in energy efficiency improvement. The introduction of a new physical quantity, entransy, provides a new perspective for connections of operating parameters of the system with the multifields and structural parameters of heat- and mass-transfer surfaces. This paper summarizes the results of the application of the entransy theory in thermal power generation systems recently, focusing on the heat, flow, and mass entransy dissipation-based optimization on the tail flue of boiler and cold-end systems. Then, an outlook on the problems to be solved and the energy-saving potentials, as well as optimization targets of each key subsystem, is provided to offer references for further improving the operating conditions of thermal power units during the energy transition period.

To tackle the issue of climate change and environmental degradation debates regarding carbon neutrality is on the rise. Regional Comprehensive Economic Cooperation (RCEP), the leading trading union, covers nearly third of global economy, world population, is responsible for thirty percent of global trade and global gross domestic product. The existent study tests the impact of financial, economic, political, and composite risk on consumption-based carbon dioxide emissions (CCO2) in selected RCEP economies during the period of 1990 to 2020. The empirical analysis consists of cross-sectional dependence, slope heterogeneity, cross-sectional augmented panel unit root test, Westerlund cointegration, second-generation cross-section augmented autoregressive distributed lags model (CS-ARDL), and panel causality test. Further, we explore the role of imports, renewable energy supply, exports, and gross domestic product per-capita on CCO2. The empirical results suggest that the less political risk help to mitigate while the lower financial, economic, and composite risk increase CCO2 emissions in selected RCEP economies. Moreover, exports and renewable energy supply show mitigating effect, whereas imports show upsurge in CCO2. Additionally, a bidirectional causality exists between exports and CCO2, imports and CCO2, GDP per-capita and CCO2, political risk and CCO2, and renewable energy and CCO2 emissions, while a one-way causality from financial risk, composite risk, and economic risk to CCO2. Renewable energy supplies along with the improvement in sub-components of political risk, for instance, corruption, government stability, would help to effectively tackle the issue of CCO2 emissions.

Dr. Le Xie is a Professor, Chancellor EDGES Fellow, and Presidential Impact Fellow in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Texas A&M, and the Assistant Director-Energy Digitization at Texas A&M Energy Institute. He was awarded the 2017 IEEE PES Outstanding Young Engineer Award for the best power engineer under 35. He is the founding chair of IEEE PES Subcommittee on Big Data & Analytics for Grid Operations. Dr. Chanan Singh is Irma Runyon Chair Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering at Texas A&M. He is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering, a Foreign Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering, and a Foreign Fellow of Chinese Society of Electrical Engineering. He is a Fellow of IEEE. He received the inaugural IEEE-PES Roy Billinton Power System Reliability Award. He received the 1998 Outstanding Power Engineering Educator Award given by the IEEE Power Engineering Society. Dr. Sanjoy K. Mitter joined MIT in 1969 where he has been a Professor of Electrical Engineering since 1973. He was the Director of the MIT Laboratory for Information and Decision Systems from 1981 to 1999. Dr. Mitter was elected a Foreign Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering. He is a Fellow of the IEEE and IFAC. He is the winner of the 2000 IEEE Control Systems Award. In 1988, he was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Engineering. Dr. Munther A. Dahleh is the founding Director of MIT’s Institute for Data Systems and Society, and the William A. Coolidge Professor in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. He is a four-time recipient of the George Axelby outstanding paper award for best paper in IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control. He is also the recipient of the Donald P. Eckman award from the American Control Council in 1993 for the best control engineer under 35. He is a Fellow of IEEE and a Fellow of IFAC. Dr. Shmuel S. Oren is Professor of the Graduate School and the Earl J. Isaac Professor in the Science and Analysis of Decision Making in the Department of Industrial Engineering and Operations Research at the University of California at Berkeley and former Chairman of that department. He is a co-founder and the Berkeley site director, of PSerc—a multi-university Power Systems Research Center since 1996. He has also been a member of the California ISO Market Surveillance Committee. He is a Life Fellow of the IEEE, Fellow of INFORMS and a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering.

To provide a scientific basis for the policies for the development of wind energy and towards the goal of carbon neutrality in China and local governments, changes in wind energy potential over China were investigated based on the bias-corrected ensemble mean (CENS) of high-resolution dynamical downscaling projections using the RCP2.6, RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 emission scenarios. Firstly, evaluation indicated that CENS could better reproduce the long-term mean and interannual variability of surface wind speed over China compared to the original simulation outputs, providing a reliable basis for future projections. Projection of the averaged wind power density of China showed a decreasing trend during 2020–2099 in all four seasons under all three scenarios, with the significant (p

As a kind of relatively clean fossil energy, natural gas will face severe uncertainties in the background of carbon neutrality. Reviewing the medium- and long-term development trend of natural gas consumption is the prerequisite to better understanding the status of natural gas and ensure the sustainable development of natural gas industry. In this paper, a multi-model comparison framework is established on the basis of 8 representative integrated assessment models (CE3METL, DNE21+, IPAC, AIM/CGE, IMAGE, REMIND, WITCH and POLES). Then, the medium- and long-term evolution trend of China's total primary energy consumption and natural gas consumption in different scenarios of climate policy is discussed. In addition, comparative analysis is conducted on key time nodes such as 2030, 2045 and 2060. And the following research results are obtained. Firstly, the prediction results of most models indicate that China's total primary energy consumption in 2060 will be lower than the level in 2019 except for the scenario of national determined contribution (NDC). Secondly, by 2060, the carbon neutrality goal year, the cross-model average level of natural gas consumption under the NDC, 2.0 °C, and 1.5 °C scenarios will be 6943 × 108 m3, 4342 × 108 m3 and 2502 × 108 m3, respectively. Thirdly, under the 1.5 °C scenario, the decrease of total primary energy consumption shall begin in 2020, which means that faster technological progress and more effective combination of “nudge” policies are needed. Fourthly, under the temperature control goal of 2.0 °C, natural gas consumption will account for about 13.6% of China's primary energy consumption in 2060, and this proportion will drop to 9% under the stricter 1.5 °C scenario. In conclusion, the multi-model comparison results can present different development paths of China's total primary energy consumption and natural gas consumption and its proportion during 2020–2060 more comprehensively, so as to provide support for formulating the medium- and long-term policies and strategies of natural gas industry under the challenge of climate change.

In recent years, the rapid rise of carbon dioxide concentration makes global warming increasingly serious, which leads to sea-level rise, coastal lowland inundation, glacier melting, extreme weather, species extinction and other environmental problems. China, as the largest carbon dioxide emitter, is facing climate change. In 2020, the Chinese government promised at the UN General Assembly to achieve the peak of carbon by 2030, and also put forward the goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2060. To achieve the carbon peak and carbon in target, China needs to reduce the use of fossil energy and replace the use of fossil energy with renewable energy with less carbon dioxide emissions. Tidal energy, as a low-carbon renewable energy, is an important alternative to fossil energy. But can the tide be developed at the expense of the environment? In this paper, the impact of the development of tidal energy on the environment is analyzed and elaborated. According to the environmental impact, the solutions of developing environment-friendly tidal energy, wave energy and temperature difference energy are given. Based on this, policy suggestions are put forward to the Chinese government. The research results of this paper will provide reference for developing countries to develop and utilize tidal energy for power generation.

This article analyzes institutional, procedural, and behavioral attributes, principles, and indicators of typology of challenges and threats caused by the coronavirus pandemic in the world. The analysis shows that most countries faced external shocks caused by COVID-19 in the absence of a universal social protection system, a reliable health system, a plan to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, or a stable real economy with quality jobs. Economic security has become an important priority, although this is not about social protection, but also about supporting strategic sectors of the economy. Balancing on the brink of the needfor socialprotection, on the one hand, and the rise of austerity, on the other, governments opted for severe economic restrictions. Thus, through the naaliticos method the authors describen the main geopolitical trends that will be the basis for the construction of a new world order that awaits us on the other side of the pandemic, including deglobalization, the geopolitical rise of China, the severe restrictions on human and civil rights, the intensification of the interstate armed forces, in context of growing conflicts and local protests.

The climate emergency calls for decisive actions to achieve CO2 emissions reductions globally and in China. Although China has made substantial progress in renewable energy deployment and has promi...

The potential of tree component neutralization was studied to understand the relationship between livestock, forest production and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The objective of this work was to ...

Background Understanding a carbon budget from a national perspective is essential for establishing effective plans to reduce atmospheric CO2 growth. The national characteristics of carbon budgets are reflected in atmospheric CO2 variations; however, separating regional influences on atmospheric signals is challenging owing to atmospheric CO2 transport. Therefore, in this study, we examined the characteristics of atmospheric CO2 variations over South and North Korea during 2000–2016 and unveiled the causes of their regional differences in the increasing rate of atmospheric CO2 concentrations by utilizing atmospheric transport modeling. Results The atmospheric CO2 concentration in South Korea is rising by 2.32 ppm year− 1, which is more than the globally-averaged increase rate of 2.05 ppm year− 1. Atmospheric transport modeling indicates that the increase in domestic fossil energy supply to support manufacturing export-led economic growth leads to an increase of 0.12 ppm year− 1 in atmospheric CO2 in South Korea. Although enhancements of terrestrial carbon uptake estimated from both inverse modeling and process-based models have decreased atmospheric CO2 by up to 0.02 ppm year− 1, this decrease is insufficient to offset anthropogenic CO2 increases. Meanwhile, atmospheric CO2 in North Korea is also increasing by 2.23 ppm year− 1, despite a decrease in national CO2 emissions close to carbon neutrality. The great increases estimated in both South Korea and North Korea are associated with changes in atmospheric transport, including increasing emitted and transported CO2 from China, which have increased the national atmospheric CO2 concentrations by 2.23 ppm year− 1 and 2.27 ppm year− 1, respectively. Conclusions This study discovered that economic activity is the determinant of regional differences in increasing atmospheric CO2 in the Korea Peninsula. However, from a global perspective, changes in transported CO2 are a major driver of rising atmospheric CO2 over this region, yielding an increase rate higher than the global mean value. Our findings suggest that accurately separating the contributions of atmospheric transport and regional sources to the increasing atmospheric CO2 concentrations is important for developing effective strategies to achieve carbon neutrality at the national level.

China, the world's largest emitter of carbon dioxide, has promised to become carbon neutral before 2060 and to begin cutting its pollutant emissions. Is China's environmental target achievable in the forthcoming 14th and 15th five-year periods (2021–2030)? Widespread attention has been devoted to end-of-pipe measurements. However, few efforts have been made to examine the optimal path of industrial upgradation with respect to the economy–energy–environment objectives. To fill this gap, this study proposes a dynamic optimization model to examine the desirable evolution path of industrial restructure. The main findings are as follows. First, to achieve the energy and environmental targets, the optimal share of tertiary industry should increase from 28% to 57% by 2030. Secondary industry should fall by 44.68%, and primary industry should be relatively stable. Second, coal will still dominate the total consumption despite a slight decline of 6.4% in the next decades. However, oil proportion may decline significantly from 26.7% to 15.2%. Non-fossil energy sources will increase from 10.6% to 28.5%. Third, with the optimization of economic structure, the GDP growth will decouple from energy consumption and gas emissions. By comparing different scenarios, it appears that the results are more sensitive to energy and emission efficiency rather than economic constraints. In the next decades, industrial upgradation will play a more important role than end-of-pipe treatment for the dual objective of economic development and environmental governance. The desirable restructuring roadmap can provide explicit guidance for future policy-making.

To meet the newest carbon emission reduction and carbon neutrality targets, the capacity of variable renewable energy sources in China is planned to double in the next five years. A high penetration of renewable energy brings significant power system flexibility challenges, and the requirements for flexible resources become increasingly critical. Energy storage, as an effective and adaptable solution, may still be too expensive for peak shaving and renewable energy integration. A new type of business model has been proposed that uses cloud-based platforms to aggregate distributed energy storage resources to provide flexibility services to power systems and consumers. In such cloudbased platforms, storage resources can be more strategically used so that the unit cost of providing the service can be reduced. In the actual implementation of cloud-based energy storage, distributed resources have also been expanded from batteries to a variety of solutions, such as variable loads and heat storage.

California is committed to achieving carbon neutrality to reduce the threat of climate change by 2045. This will require deep decarbonization across all economic sectors and necessitate rigorous planning to keep energy safe, reliable, and affordable. Southern California Edison (SCE), a utility that delivers electricity to 15 million people across southern, central, and coastal California, undertook an indepth analysis to identify a feasible and economical path to realizing California's greenhouse gas reduction goals and achieve carbon neutrality at the lowest reasonable cost by 2045.

Purpose The University of Michigan (U-M) is planning its course toward carbon neutrality. A key component in U-M carbon accounting is the calculation of carbon sinks via estimation of carbon storage and biosequestration on U-M landholdings. Here, this paper aims to compare multiple remote sensing methods across U-M natural lands and urban campuses to determine the accurate and efficient protocol for land assessment and ecosystem service valuation that other institutions may scale as relevant. Design/methodology/approach This paper tested three remote sensing methods to determine land use and land cover (LULC), namely, unsupervised classification, supervised classification and supervised classification incorporating delineated wetlands. Using confusion matrices, this paper tested remote sensing approaches to ground-truthed data, the paper obtained via field-based vegetation surveys across a subset of U-M landholdings. Findings In natural areas, supervised classification incorporating delineated wetlands was the most accurate and efficient approach. In urban settings, maps incorporating institutional knowledge and campus tree surveys better estimated LULC. Using LULC and literature-based carbon data, this paper estimated that U-M lands store 1.37–3.68 million metric tons of carbon and sequester 45,000–86,000 Mt CO2e/yr, valued at $2.2m–$4.3m annually ($50/metric ton, social cost of carbon). Originality/value This paper compared methods to identify an efficient and accurate remote sensing methodology to identify LULC and estimate carbon storage, biosequestration rates and economic values of ecosystem services provided.

The use of clean electricity to replace fossil energy burning for heating is an important emission reduction way to achieve carbon neutrality. Without a good business model, it is very difficult to promote electric heating as a replacement for coal-fired systems in some areas with abundant coal resources. This study proposed a new business model for electric heating with stakeholders that included the government, the power grid company, and heat users. Based on this model, a specific tri-objective optimization model was proposed with the electric heating promotion power, heating electricity price, and government subsidy as variables to characterize the game relationship of the stakeholders, and the components of the stakeholder benefit function were analyzed in detail. A classical multi-objective genetic algorithm was used to solve the model. Finally, an “electrical heating” project for a typical area in China was analyzed, and four promotion cases were examined. The results showed that the power grid company and users had an antagonistic relationship in relation to the electricity price, but the best solution was found for all three stakeholders due to the high financial subsidies provided by the government.