JOURNAL OF NATURAL RESOURCES ›› 2019, Vol. 34 ›› Issue (11): 2305-2316.

• Resource Economics •

### Research on coupling degree and coupling path between China's carbon emission efficiency and industrial structure upgrade

ZHOU Di1, WANG Xue-qin2

1. 1. School of Mathematics and Statistics, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, Guangzhou 510006, China;
2. School of Information Science and Technology, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, Guangzhou 510006, China
• Received:2019-04-03 Revised:2019-07-11 Online:2019-11-28 Published:2019-11-28

Abstract: The study of the coupling relationship and coupling path of carbon emission efficiency and industrial structure upgrade is of great practical significance to the green development of China in the new era and for the construction of a beautiful China. Firstly, the carbon emission efficiency is calculated by the super-efficient SBM model containing undesired output. Then, the coupling degree between the efficiency of regional carbon emission and the industrial structure upgrade is calculated and analyzed by the extended coupling model, and the provinces are divided into multiple layers according to their coupling degrees and coupling characteristics. Finally, the coupling path of the two factors is designed under the framework of dynamic distribution. The research found that: (1) There lies an obvious difference between the spatial and temporal pattern of carbon emission efficiency and high-grade industrial structure level. In terms of their coupling degrees, nearly half of the provinces are between 0.2 and 0.4, which can be considered as moderately and mildly imbalanced recession. Besides, according to the coupling characteristics, nearly half of the provinces belong to the coupling type of "low level coordination" with low development degree and high coordination degree. (2) There is an obvious inconsistency between carbon emission efficiency and the industrial structure upgrade in China from the aspect of reginal dynamic distribution. The former has a severer degree of cure than the latter. Therefore, China should improve the degree of coupling between regional carbon emission efficiency and industrial structure on the basis of mitigating the solidification of interregional carbon emission efficiency. (3) The paper designs the coupling path of carbon emission efficiency and the industrial structure upgrade in China on the basis of the coupling classification diagram, which can not only alleviate the dynamic incoordination of the two factors, but also effectively enhance their coupling degree among regions of China.