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    Dual Carbon Goals and Green Transition
  • Dual Carbon Goals and Green Transition
    DENG Ming-jiang, MING Bo, LI Yan, HUANG Qiang, LI Peng, WU Meng
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    Xinjiang is one of the most important resource treasure houses and energy bases in China. How to construct a clean energy system under the guidance of carbon peak and carbon neutrality goals is related to national energy security. In this paper, we summarize reserves and distribution of main energy sources in Xinjiang, comb the current situation of energy production and consumption, analyze main problems faced by energy transition, and put forward pathways towards a cleaner energy system with relevant countermeasures and suggestions. It is shown that: (1) Fossil energy accounts for more than 85% in the existing energy system of Xinjiang, making the carbon emission reduction task arduous. (2) Wind and solar curtailments are an acute problem of Xinjiang at present, and the electricity curtailment rate is higher than the national average. (3) To promote the green transformation of Xinjiang's energy system, we must lower the growth rate of coal consumption, accelerate the construction of hydro-solar-wind-storage integrated power system, expand the channel of "Xinjiang's power transmission", advance the course of "electrified Xinjiang", and develop CCUS and new energy storage technologies. These findings can provide reference for Xinjiang to achieve the carbon peak and carbon neutrality goals.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Natural Resources Management
  • Dual Carbon Goals and Natural Resources Management
    ZHAO Rong-qin, HUANG Xian-jin, YUN Wen-ju, WU Ke-ning, CHEN Yin-rong, WANG Shao-jian, LU He-li, FANG Kai, LI Yu
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    The targets of carbon emission peak and carbon neutrality will certainly promote the systematic revolution of China's economy and society. Natural resources are crucial materials and space carrier for human activities. Low-carbon-based innovation of natural resource management system and territorial space governance pattern is of great significance for enhancing ecosystem carbon sinks and resources supporting capacity, improving resource utilization efficiency, and promoting long-term low-carbon transition of the whole society. Focusing on natural resource management under the target of carbon emission peak and carbon neutrality, nine scholars put forward key strategies for the innovation of natural resource management, which mainly include resource coupling management, territorial space optimization and land control, fine farmland management, land use carbon metabolism regulation, ecological carbon sink system and sustainable forests management. This provides a vital guidance for the establishment of low-carbon natural resource management system based on multi-level perspectives of "resource elements-territorial space-ecosystem", which helps to comprehensively improve carbon sink/emission reduction function within the field of natural resources. Generally, the researchers suggested that the systematic response framework of natural resource management under the targets of carbon emission peak and carbon neutrality should be established. The future top-level design should be strengthened to establish a multi-level collaborative management system of natural resources based on element-space-system. Carbon cycle monitoring network and carbon accounting standards system related to natural resources and territorial space with Chinese characteristics should be regulated. Resources coupling management, elaborative spatial management and land structure optimization should be strengthened to explore different territorial space control schemes. The management of resource circulation within nature-economy-society system should be improved to establish a net-framework for carbon metabolism and its regional nexus and realize regional coordinated carbon emission reduction based on resource optimization management. The carbon sink function of natural resources and territorial space should be stressed, which should be incorporated into the carbon trading and ecological compensation system. The regional horizontal carbon compensation system should be established based on carbon neutrality evaluation of territorial space to promote the coordinated emission reduction and development among different regions.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Natural Resources Management
    DING Ming-lei, YANG Xiao-na, ZHAO Rong-qin, ZHANG Zhan-ping, XIAO Lian-gang, XIE Zhi-xiang
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    Territorial space planning is a national basic and binding planning for guiding land use, ecological protection, industrial layout, urban and rural construction and regional development. In the context of the current strategy of carbon emission peak and carbon neutrality, bringing the carbon neutrality goal into the territorial space planning and governance system is of great significance in promoting the comprehensive low-carbon transformation of the economic and social system. In this paper, we constructed a theoretical framework for the optimization of territorial space pattern, analyzed the internal relationship between territorial space pattern, human-land relationship and carbon revenue and expenditure, and further discussed the optimization and regulation mechanism of territorial space pattern under the goal of carbon neutrality from the perspective of economy-society-ecology complex system. This study put forward the optimization path of territorial space pattern for carbon neutrality including accounting system of carbon revenue and expenditure for territorial space, "double evaluation" method for carbon balance, carbon risk monitoring and evaluation for territorial space, three-line delimitation under space constraints of carbon emissions, carbon emission peak and industrial spatial structure regulation. Finally, the key areas of territorial space pattern optimization under the goal of carbon neutrality were identified from improvement scheme of differentiated ecological carbon sequestration, accounting system of carbon revenue and expenditure for territorial space in line with China's national conditions, territorial space planning and control scheme for carbon neutrality goal, carbon emission assessment of construction land based on life cycle, low-carbon and efficient territorial space governance system, and carbon compensation system of multi-level territorial space construction.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Natural Resources Management
    WU Hao-yue, MENG Yue, HUANG Han-jiao, CHEN Wen-kuan
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    The low-carbon transition of cropland use can help to mitigate climate change to a certain extent. Based on carbon emissions accounting and sequestration of cropland use, this paper attempted to develop a theoretical framework for analyzing the low-carbon performance of cropland use. Then, the GB-US-S-SBM was applied to assess the performance in China's 30 provincial-level regions (hereafter provinces) from 2000 to 2019, and to examine the spatiotemporal characteristics. The study found that: (1) Overall, the intensities of carbon emissions, sequestration and net sequestration were 1.980 t∙hm-2, 5.624 t∙hm-2, and 3.644 t∙hm-2, respectively, indicating that the cropland use system was a major carbon sink. (2) Nationwide, the low-carbon performance of cropland use went through four stages, namely, ups and downs, slow growth, fluctuation, and fast growth. According to the initial performance and growth rate, the provinces were classified into five types, namely, low performance with high potential (15 provinces such as Beijing), low performance with stable trend (4 provinces such as Jiangsu), high stable performance (3 provinces such as Chongqing), high performance with low potential (3 provinces such as Hubei), and high performance with high potential (5 provinces such as Jilin). At the early stage, provinces with high performance were clustered in the southwest, while those with low performance were agglomerated in the northwest. High-performance provinces were mainly located in the northwest and northeast, and low-performance provinces were distributed in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River. (3) σ convergence was not observed in the performance of the whole country, central region, or eastern region, while the performance of northeastern and western region strictly followed σ convergence. Both China and its four regions exhibited β convergence, indicating that provinces tended to chase each other in performance. This paper may provide a basis for the differentiated low-carbon transition of regional cropland use.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Natural Resources Management
    XUE Cai-xia, LI Yuan-yuan, HU Chao, YAO Shun-bo
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    Studying the spatio-temporal patterns of net carbon sinks under conservation tillage is of great significance to the formulation of policies. Based on the analysis of the mechanism of carbon sink and emissions and the construction of its measurement method under conservation tillage, this paper analyzed the spatio-temporal pattern of net carbon sink and predicted its potential under conservation tillage from 2000 to 2019 in the provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities, hereafter provinces) of China. The results showed that: first, the carbon sink under conservation tillage is about twice the carbon emissions, soil carbon sequestration accounts for more than 2/3 of carbon sink, and biological carbon sink accounts for less than 1/3. Second, from 2000 to 2019, the net carbon sink under conservation tillage in China showed an increasing trend year by year, and the net carbon sink in North, Northwest and Southeast China increased significantly. The net carbon sink showed a trend of expansion-agglomeration-expansion in space, with the center of gravity shifting from north to south. Third, the net carbon sink under conservation tillage in the whole country had the characteristics of obvious spatial imbalance. In 2019, there was a "three-legged" pattern in North, Northwest and Southeast China. The seven provinces of Henan, Shandong, Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, Anhui, Hubei and Jiangxi belong to high-carbon sink areas, Hebei, Jilin, Shaanxi, and Shanxi belong to low-carbon sink areas, and other provinces belong to carbon-neutrality areas. Fourth, the net carbon sink potential under conservation tillage from 2020 to 2030 will continue to increase, and the peak value will be between 57943800 t C and 79629300 t C in 2030.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Natural Resources Management
    ZHANG Ping-ping, LI Yan-hong, YIN Hao-ran, CHEN Quan-tong, DONG Qing-dong, ZHU Lian-qi
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    Mountains are sensitive areas to global change and they play an important role in the ecological security and development of human society. The changes of mountain ecosystem services and the carrying capacity of the ecological environment have always been focusing on hotspots in geography and ecology. In this paper, the Qinling-Daba Mountains, the main body of the north-south transitional zone of China, is taken as the research object. The CA-Markov model and InVEST model are used to simulate and predict (2000-2040) the ecosystem carbon storage changes of the Qinling-Daba Mountains under different land-use scenarios. The spatial distribution difference of ecosystem carbon storage of the study area is discussed by using the hot spot analysis (Getis-Ord Gi*). The results show that: (1) From 2000 to 2040, the main types of land use/land cover changes are farmland, forestland, grassland, and construction land. (2) From 2000 to 2020, the ecosystem carbon storage increased by 1.12×107 t; under the natural growth scenario from 2020 to 2040, the carbon storage loss is severe, down by 50.24×107 t; under the ecological protection scenario, there is less carbon loss, with a decrease of 29.52×107 t, indicating that the adoption of ecological environment protection policies can effectively control the reduction of ecosystem carbon storage. (3) The changes in land use/land cover and ecosystem carbon storage show significant consistency. The change of land use quantity determined the quality and spatial distribution pattern of ecosystem carbon storage. (4) With the rise of the altitude, carbon stocks show a trend of "increasing first and then decreasing"; with the increase of the slope, carbon stocks show a "W"-shaped change trend. (5) The hot spot analysis results show that from 2000 to 2020, carbon storage hot spots and cold spots were scattered in the study area; under the natural growth scenario in 2040, the distribution range of carbon storage cold and hot spots will tend to increase gradually; compared with 2020, the ecological protection scenario in 2040 shows little change in the distribution range of the cold and hot spots of ecosystem carbon storage in the Qinling-Daba Mountains.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Natural Resources Management
    XIANG Shu-jiang, ZHANG Qian, WANG Dan, WANG Shu, WANG Zi-fang, XIE Yu-qi, GAO Ming
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    Land use/cover change (LUCC) is an important driving factor that affects the carbon storage of regional ecosystems. Studying the response and vulnerability of carbon storage to LUCC is significant to the realization of the "dual carbon" goal. Taking the nine districts of Chongqing municipality as an example, the paper deeply explores the response of carbon storage to land use transfer and uses the Potential Impact Index (PI) to assess the vulnerability of ecosystem carbon storage services. The results show that: (1) Between 2000 and 2020, the area of cultivated land in the main urban area decreased by 743.29 km2, and the area of construction land surged by 773.48 km2. The land transfer area accounted for 6.05% in the first 10 years and 13.98% in the next 10 years. The conversion of cultivated land to construction land is the main land transfer. (2) In the study period, the carbon storage in the main urban area decreased by 5.78 Tg. The encroachment of cultivated land by construction land is the leading factor in the rapid decline of carbon storage. The distribution of carbon storage presents a spatial pattern of "low in the middle, but high in the surroundings". (3) Over the 20 years, the main urban districts were carbon sources. The land use degree index increased by 14.73, and the PI index ranged from -2.50 Tg to -2.59 Tg, both having negative potential impacts on the main urban area, and the vulnerability continued to deteriorate from 2000 to 2015. In 2020, the vulnerability eased. The results can provide references for the sustainable development of regional ecology and the formulation of future land use management policies, and for other similar mountainous cities in western China.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Natural Resources Management
    WANG Tian-fu, GONG Zhi-wen, DENG Yuan-jie
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    In the context of the "dual-carbon" goal, the carbon sink of terrestrial vegetation ecosystems is an important way to achieve the carbon neutrality. In order to effectively identify the priority areas for improving the quality and efficiency of vegetation carbon sink service, the InVEST model was used to quantitatively evaluate the spatiotemporal evolution characteristics and distribution pattern of vegetation carbon storage in Shaanxi province. Based on this, we analyze the impact of land use/cover types on carbon storage changes, study the spatial differences in the growth of carbon sinks in forest-grass ecological construction, and determine the target areas for quality and efficiency improvement in ecological environment construction areas. The results show that: (1) The land use types in Shaanxi are mainly cultivated land, forest land and grassland, and the change of land use transfer mainly occurs in the mutual transformation among the three types. (2) From 1980 to 2020, the carbon storage of ecosystems in Shaanxi increased by 91.88×106 t, an increase of 3.16%, showing the zonal distribution characteristics of "generally high in the south and low in the north, and obviously high or low in some areas". (3) The conversion of farmland to forest (grass) project has obvious effect on the improvement of carbon sink capacity, and there is a global spatial correlation, which is manifested as a certain spatial convergence and agglomeration phenomenon. (4) Northern Shaanxi is a high priority area and priority area for ecological protection and restoration projects, Southern Shaanxi is a medium priority area, and Guanzhong Plain is a general priority area. Based on the differences in the average annual growth rate of carbon sinks in ecosystems in different districts and counties, the priority ecological governance areas were determined to provide a reference for realizing the regional management of the leading mode of ecological restoration projects and improving the quality and efficiency of carbon sinks.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Sustainable Urbanization
  • Dual Carbon Goals and Sustainable Urbanization
    CHEN Ming-xing, CHENG Jia-fan, ZHOU Yuan, DING Zi-jin, MA Hai-tao
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    China's announcement of its "carbon neutrality" target is an important commitment in tackling climate change, which has attracted extensive attention at home and abroad. How to realize the target is a complex systematic science question, which involves the multi-layer coupling process and action mechanism of atmosphere, lithosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere and anthroposphere, requiring interdisciplinary, integrated and collaborative researches. This paper first briefly reviews the origins of carbon neutrality proposal including climate change and temperature control targets. Then it summarizes the multiple paths of carbon source and carbon sink to achieve carbon neutrality. It further emphasizes the importance of promoting sustainable urbanization from the demand side of carbon sources to the success of carbon neutrality, which is very likely to a direct and effective approach with low-cost and high potential. The core part of the target puts forward eight significant scientific topics: a nexus between climate change, carbon neutrality, and sustainable urbanization; the roadmaps and timetables for carbon neutrality of whole China and across regions; accurate accounting of carbon emissions at the urban regional scale; green lifestyles and low carbon society; green mode of production and low carbon economy; energy structural optimization; risk and uncertainty; and innovations of long-term governance mechanisms of carbon neutrality. Finally, the paper concludes opportunities and challenges of the field in the current situation.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Sustainable Urbanization
    TANG Zhi-Peng, YU Hao-Jie, CHEN Ming-Xing, CHENG Jia-Fan
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    To respond to global climate change, reducing carbon dioxide emissions is one of the vital goals of China's medium- to long-term development. Based on the extremum condition of function, this paper studies the theoretical conditions of carbon peak, and verifies the results based on examples of some main developed countries. It also analyzes present situation in China according to the above conditions, and finally forecasts China's carbon dioxide emissions during the process of carbon neutrality in 2060 after carbon emission peak in 2030 under baseline and enhanced scenarios. The results are shown as follows: (1) Based on an IPAT approach, carbon dioxide emission function is divided into three factors of population, per capita GDP and carbon intensity. The year of carbon peak emerges when the sum of the annual growth rates of the three factors changes from positive to negative. This conclusion has been verified by the historical data of selected main developed countries. (2) According to the historical data of China's population, per capita GDP and carbon intensity, the sum of the annual growth rates of the three factors has declined since 2003 and fluctuated between 0.01 and 0.02 in recent years, which indicates that there is a positive trend towards carbon emission peak generally. Moreover, according to the expected development goals of the three factors, the upper limit of China's carbon dioxide emission peak in 2030 is 11.22 billion tons. If the compound annual per capita GDP growth rate keeps unchanged from 2021 to 2035, the absolute value of compound annual growth rate of carbon intensity needs to be 0.14% higher than that of per capita GDP. (3) Given the premise condition that the total energy consumption decreases gradually, in 2060, the proportion of non-fossil energy is about 65% and the carbon dioxide emission is about 3.14 billion tons under the baseline scenario, while it is about 70% and 2.66 billion tons respectively under the enhanced scenario. However, carbon sequestration technologies such as carbon sink and CCUS are still uncertain, and the task of carbon neutrality is still arduous. To achieve carbon peak and carbon neutrality, it is crucial that energy consumption should be controlled and low-carbon consumption behavior should be advocated.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Sustainable Urbanization
    XU Ying-qi, CHENG Yu, WANG Jing-jing, LIU Na
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    China puts forward the strategic goal of achieving carbon peaks by 2030 and carbon neutrality by 2060. Improving carbon emission efficiency and promoting green and low-carbon development are important ways to achieve the "dual carbon" goal. The study uses the Super-SBM model that includes undesired output to measure the carbon emission efficiency of 68 low carbon cities in China from 2003 to 2018 and analyzes their spatio-temporal evolution characteristics. The panel regression model is used to analyze the influencing factors of urban carbon emission efficiency. The following conclusions are drawn: (1) The carbon emission efficiency of low carbon city has shown an overall upward trend over time, from 0.169 to 0.423, with an average annual growth rate of 6.31%, and there is still room for improvement. (2) Regional differences in the carbon emission efficiency of low carbon cities show a trend of shrinking first and then gradually expanding, and a declining distribution pattern of "from eastern to central and western region" in space; the carbon emission efficiency of pilot city at various levels is characterized as "megacity > supercity > large city > medium-sized city > small city". (3) Economic development level, industrial structure, urbanization level, green technology innovation and carbon emission efficiency of a pilot city are significantly positively correlated, and the intensity of foreign investment has restrictions on urban carbon emission efficiency. There are some differences in the degree of influence of each factor on the three regions and cities of different sizes. The paper puts forward countermeasures and suggestions from the aspects of innovation input, industrial structure and regional differentiation, which has certain reference significance for promoting urban green and low-carbon development and the construction of ecological civilization.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Sustainable Urbanization
    HAN Nan, LUO Xin-yu
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    Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) is not only one of core economic regions of China, but also the key area of energy consumption and air pollution of the country. The carbon emissions of this region account for about 1/5 of the country's total. The proposal of China's "carbon peak and carbon neutrality" target has aroused widespread concern from the domestic and international community. Therefore, exploring the carbon emission trend and reduction potential of the BTH region under different scenarios is of great significance for China to achieve the carbon peak goal by 2030 on schedule. By analyzing the relationship between carbon emission and its influencing factors, this paper constructs a dynamic model of carbon emission system in the study region. On this basis, six scenarios are set up from the perspective of industrial structure, energy intensity, energy structure, environmental regulation, science and technology investment, and comprehensive regulation to predict the impact of different schemes on the peak time and peak value and reduction potential of carbon emissions in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei respectively. The results show that under the baseline scenario, according to the existing system behavior law, Beijing has reached its carbon peak, Tianjin is expected to reach its carbon peak in 2023, and Hebei is unlikely to reach its carbon peak before 2035. In the coordinated development scenario, that is, the comprehensive regulation policy, compared with the single measure scenario, the effect of carbon emission reduction in each region is the best. Among them, the carbon emissions of Beijing from 2020 to 2030 will decrease by 13.52% on average compared with the baseline scenario. The carbon peak time of Tianjin can be advanced to 2021, and the carbon emissions of Hebei can reach the peak in 2030. Under the single measure scenario, the environmental protection scenario has the most significant effect on carbon emission reduction in Beijing, while the energy conservation and emission reduction scenario is the best development model to achieve the carbon emission peak in Tianjin and Hebei. Meanwhile, considering the differences in the peaks of carbon emissions in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei, China should formulate differentiated carbon peaking strategy and emission reduction path.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Sustainable Urbanization
    JIANG Yun-chen, ZHONG Su-juan, WANG Yi, HUANG Xian-jin
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    China's carbon emission peak is an important agenda for global climate governance. The research on carbon emission peak in China by province has important influence and practical support for the national carbon mission peak and path arrangement. Based on the Hybrid-units Energy Input-Output model, this paper built a carbon emissions peak prediction model. Under 9 combined scenarios of economic development and carbon emission intensity improvement, the total carbon emissions of 30 provincial-level regions from 2020 to 2040 were predicted (except Tibet, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan). Then, this paper compared the peak values of different periods to estimate the carbon emission peak time. On this basis, the Probit model was used to analyze the influencing factors of whether regions can reach carbon emission peak before 2030. The results show that: (1) The carbon peak time varies significantly among provincial regions of China with a north-south strip aggregation in the spatial pattern. (2) The improvement of carbon emission intensity has a greater impact on the emission peak time, and the improvement rate of 4% per year is most favorable for reaching the peak by 2030. (3) Industrial structure, the degree of government intervention, and the degree of openness have a significant impact on whether the carbon peak target can be achieved by 2030.

  • Dual Carbon Goals and Sustainable Urbanization
    YU Jian-hui, XIAO Ruo-lan, MA Ren-feng, ZHANG Wen-zhong
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    Carbon neutrality is a common problem faced by all countries in the world. Against the background of economic globalization and trade liberalization, the total volume of international trade grows rapidly. With the deep international division of labor and industrial transfer, producers and consumers of trade objects have caused serious spatial displacement on the land surface. The bibliometric software CiteSpace is applied to analyze relevant literature on carbon neutrality under the theme of international trade and reveal the trend of "carbon neutrality" in international trade. The results show that: (1) The spatiotemporal evolution of greenhouse gases on a global scale has made trans-regional and multi-scale global carbon governance more complex. The developed countries have transferred high-pollution and low-value chain industries to the developing countries, and the principle of carbon accounting based on producer responsibility is no longer applicable to international trade cooperation. (2) Import and export trade is gradually becoming the driving force for the economic development of emerging economies. Global carbon governance should gradually move closer to the globalization of economic cooperation and regional integration. The global climate policy design should start from the fairness of the international carbon market, continuously optimize the carbon emission accounting system, improve the carbon accounting method, and analyze the expected effect of global carbon emission reduction through modeling. It is necessary to improve the awareness of the carbon emission reduction responsibility of industrial sectors, improve the utilization efficiency of industrial clean technology and energy, and to change the capacity of an ecological system to increase carbon sink and reduce emissions. While receiving technical assistance from the developed countries, emerging economies should focus on their energy industries, develop renewable energy industries, improve energy efficiency, and use economic policies and financial instruments to promote the development of their climate change investment and financing industries. Global carbon governance should pay more attention to equity, economic development, and environmental and resource differences among countries, and encourage more countries to participate in global or regional integration of carbon governance by using various carbon governance tools and ways of consultation and cooperation. The Chinese goverment must improve the carbon market mechanism, raise the level of carbon governance, and provide the "greatest common divisor" for international cooperation on carbon governance through domestic multi-industry and multi-sector emission reduction and international carbon emission reduction and carbon neutrality practices.

  • Paths to Carbon Emissions Peaking and Carbon Neutrality
  • Paths to Carbon Emissions Peaking and Carbon Neutrality
    MAO Xi-yan, HE Can-fei, WANG Pei-yu, XU Rui, HU Xing-mu-zi, HE Shu-qi
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    Trade liberalization of environmental goods offers new insights into the global efforts in response to global environmental changes. China has comparative advantages in trading energy-related products such as renewable energy equipment. The emerging environmental goods trade in China may contribute to China's commitment to carbon peak before 2030 and carbon neutrality before 2060. This study traces the trade development of environmental goods in China during 1996-2019, and depicts its structural changes in products and trading partners. Using the LMDI approach, this study decomposes carbon emissions into four components, namely, emission intensities, energy efficiencies, economic growth, and population growth. Then, the ARDL-ECM model is used to examine the co-integration of environmental goods trade and carbon emission reduction, and its long-and short-term effects. The results reveal that: (1) The development of environmental goods trade has a negative effect in terms of the short-term carbon emissions, but a positive one in the long run. (2) Environmental goods trade enlarges the carbon reduction effects of energy efficiencies, and ruduces the carbon emissions aroused by economic growth. (3) The concentration of specific products may promote carbon reduction in the short run. Nevertheless, carbon reduction, in the long run, requires a diversity of products. The improvement of the trade network benefits the carbon reduction in the short run. However, the increasing reliance on imports, in the long run, has adverse effects on carbon reduction. (4) Effects of environmental goods trade on carbon reduction origin from both energy-related products and the others. Non-energy-related products also exhibit their capacity in promoting energy efficiencies and economic restructuring, which contributes to carbon reduction.

  • Paths to Carbon Emissions Peaking and Carbon Neutrality
    HAN Meng-yao, XIONG Jiao, LIU Wei-dong
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    Since China's carbon peak and carbon neutrality goals were put forward, photovoltaic power generation has gradually become one of the important fields to accelerate low carbon transition. Through the analysis of spatio-temporal distribution, competitive development and emission reduction of China's photovoltaic power generation, the main conclusions can be drawn as follows: (1) From 2012 to 2020, the total installed photovoltaic capacities increased from 6.25 million kW to 253.17 million kW, dominated by centralized power stations. (2) Regions including Shandong, Jiangsu, Anhui, Henan, and Shanxi showed a high-high autocorrelation, while regions such as Guizhou showed a high-low autocorrelation. (3) Electricity consumption, carbon emissions, and R&D investment were the positive driving factors for the growth of photovoltaic installed capacities, and R&D investment had a positive impact on the growth of photovoltaic installed capacities in neighboring provinces. (4) The potential emission reduction benefits per year of China's existing photovoltaic installations could almost reach 2.0E+08 tons and the accumulated emission reduction benefits could reach 19.2E+08 tons by 2030, revealing significant emission reduction potentials for promoting the achievement of carbon peak and carbon neutrality goals.

  • Paths to Carbon Emissions Peaking and Carbon Neutrality
    WANG Huo-gen, XIAO Li-xiang, LIAO Bing
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    A system dynamics model of carbon dioxide emissions was constructed by analyzing the relationship among the influencing factors of carbon dioxide emissions and the main paths of carbon emission reduction. On this basis, the impact of four scenarios on carbon dioxide emissions were forecasted by regulating the economic growth rate of the supply side, energy structure and industrial structure so as to further discuss the contribution of major departments of carbon dioxide emission reduction. Results show that the trend of the net growth of carbon dioxide emissions slows down year by year among the four schemes. This trend plays a positive role in reducing carbon dioxide emissions through adjusting the speed of economic growth, improving energy structure and optimizing industry structure after that the net carbon emission achieves the peak. Compared with the speed of economic growth and the optimization of industry structure, the improvement of energy structure makes a greater contribution to reducing carbon dioxide emissions. Under the scheme of comprehensive regulation of the speed of economic growth, improvement of energy structure and optimization of industrial structure, net emissions of carbon dioxide will reach the peak (10.445 billion tons) in 2024 and achieve the carbon neutrality in 2058 in China, which matches with the current situation.

  • Paths to Carbon Emissions Peaking and Carbon Neutrality
    CHEN Liang-kan, CHEN Ming-xing, ZHANG Xiao-ping, CHENG Jia-fan
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    The Anthropocene indicates that human activities have exerted a significant influence on the earth system. With rapid increases in carbon emissions and changes in the underlying surface, the global process of large-scale urbanization has exacerbated the negative impact on the earth's surface and undermined the earth's habitability. Carbon neutrality is not only the international consensus on climate change, but also a key measure to build a habitable earth. Based on multi-source data, the geographical process and pattern evolution of global urbanization are analyzed in terms of multi-dimensional spatiotemporal characteristics, and the correlation between carbon emissions and urbanization is preliminarily analyzed. The main conclusions are as follows: (1) With global urbanization process continuing to advance, the demographic structure of urban and rural areas shows a divergent trend. Meanwhile, the global city scale has an overall growth, the hot spots of which are concentrated in Southeast Asia and Eastern Central Africa, and more people worldwide are living in large cities. (2) Global urban land increased significantly, from 364000 km2 in 1992 to 793000 km2 in 2018, with a growth rate of 126.0%. During the same period, Asia accounted for 45.4% of the growth and was the leading region of the world's urban land expansion. (3) With rapid urbanization, global energy carbon emissions have grown rapidly, reaching 37.67 billion tons in 2018 and 21.91 billion tons of carbon dioxide since 1970, of which the structural power sector accounted for 45.8% of the growth and the Asian region accounted for 84.3%. The correlation between urbanization rate, per capita GDP and per capita carbon emissions showed different characteristics, and obvious heterogeneity among groups with high urbanization rates and among high-income countries. We call for the establishment of interdisciplinary collaborative research to explore the relationship between livable earth, carbon neutralization and global sustainable urbanization, to recognize the potential of sustainable urbanization for carbon neutrality goals.

  • Postscript
  • Postscript
    CHEN Ming-xing, ZHAO Rong-qin
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