City-Level Features of Energy Footprints and Carbon Dioxide Emissions in Sichuan Province of China

Abstract

The sustainable development of the western region of China has always been essential to the national development strategy. The Western region has undertaken an industrial transfer from the Eastern and Central regions. Therefore, the CO2 emission intensity in the western region is higher than those of the Eastern and Central regions of China, and consequently its low-carbon development pathway has an important impact for China as a whole. Sichuan Province is not only the province with the highest CO2 emissions, but also the most economically developed province in Western China in 2018. In order to promote low carbon development in the western region, it is important to understand the features of emissions in Sichuan Province and to formulate effective energy strategies accordingly. This paper uses the IPCC regional emission accounting method to calculate the carbon emissions of 15 cities in Sichuan province, and to comply with the city-level emission accounts. The results show that the total carbon emissions of Sichuan province over the past 10 years was 3258.32 mt and reached a peak in 2012. The smelting and pressing of ferrous metals, coal mining and dressing were the leading sectors that contributed to the emissions, accounting for 17.86% and 15.82%, respectively. Raw coal, cleaned coal, and coke were the most significant contributors to CO2 emissions, accounting for 43.73%, 9.55%, and 6.60%, respectively. Following the above results, the Sichuan provincial government can formulate differentiated energy structure policies according to different energy consumption structures and carbon emission levels in the 15 cities. By controlling the level of total emissions and regulating larger industrial emitters in Sichuan province, some useful information could be provided as an essential reference for low-carbon development in Western China, and contribute to the promotion of emissions mitigation from a more holistic perspective.

The Carbon Emission Characteristics and Reduction Potential in Developing Areas: Case Study from Anhui Province, China

“…Similar case was reported that carbon emissions of forest ecological products showed a fluctuating upward trend in Zhejiang Province [ 94 ] and Xinjiang Province [ 95 ], whereas it was regarded that urgent measures should be taken to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Shandong Province, a typical province of energy consumption [ 19 ]. However, there are also some cases that reported the characteristics and dynamics of carbon emissions and carbon sinks with emission reduction potential insights in economically developing areas of China [ 40 , 75 , 77 ]. These reports found that there was much reduction potential of carbon emissions with the carbon sink as well as carbon emissions per capita and carbon intensity in Chinese economically undeveloped and developing areas [ 40 , 75 , 77 ].…”

“…However, there are also some cases that reported the characteristics and dynamics of carbon emissions and carbon sinks with emission reduction potential insights in economically developing areas of China [ 40 , 75 , 77 ]. These reports found that there was much reduction potential of carbon emissions with the carbon sink as well as carbon emissions per capita and carbon intensity in Chinese economically undeveloped and developing areas [ 40 , 75 , 77 ]. They also proposed that the government should provide a suitable economic growth and development range for the average gross domestic product growth rate, the proportions of primary industry and secondary industry, energy consumption intensity of secondary industry, and the urbanization [ 40 , 75 , 77 ].…”

“…The research time was set at 2000–2019, whereas the relevant datasets could only be retrieved from the 2001–2020 versions of the China Energy Statistical Yearbook and the Anhui Provincial Statistical Yearbook . Herein, some relevant parameters were referred to the previous reports [ 72 , 73 , 74 , 75 , 76 , 77 , 78 ].…”

“…Carbon sink is the process, activity, or mechanism of absorbing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere through afforestation, vegetation restoration and other measures, so as to reduce concentration of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere [ 62 , 63 , 64 , 65 ]. It is an important part of the ecosystems and an important way to achieve the regional carbon neutrality [ 66 , 67 , 68 , 69 , 70 , 71 , 72 , 73 , 74 , 75 , 76 ]. In the long-term grain crop planting process, grain crop production and forest coverage had a significant effect on carbon emission absorption [ 64 , 65 ].…”

“…The carbon emission inventory of 11 cities was compiled in the greater bay area and their surrounding areas based on the IPCC regional carbon emission accounting method [ 74 ]. At the same time, the IPCC regional carbon emission accounting method was adopted to calculate the carbon emission of 15 cities in Sichuan Province, China [ 75 ]. The carbon emission level of Wroclaw (Poland) was measured and analyzed by compiling the carbon gas emission inventory at the city level [ 76 ].…”