Projection of Chinese Motor Vehicle Growth, Oil Demand, and CO₂ Emissions Through 2050

Abstract

During this study a methodology was developed to project growth trends of the motor vehicle population and associated oil demand and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in China through 2050. In particular, the numbers of highway vehicles, motorcycles, and rural vehicles were projected under three scenarios of vehicle growth by following different patterns of motor vehicle growth in Europe and Asia. Projections showed that by 2030 China could have more highway vehicles than the United States has today. Three scenarios of vehicle fuel economy were also developed on the basis of current and future policy efforts to reduce vehicle fuel consumption in China and in developed countries. With the vehicle population projections and potential vehicle fuel economy data, it was projected that in 2050 China's on-road vehicles could consume approximately 614 million to 1,016 million metric tons of oil (or 12.4 million to 20.6 million barrels per day) and emit 1.9 billion to 3.2 billion metric tons (or 2.1 billion to 3.5 billion tons) of CO2 each year. Although these projections by no means imply what will happen in the Chinese transportation sector by 2050, they do demonstrate that an uncontained growth in motor vehicles and only incremental efforts to improve fuel economy will certainly result in severe consequences for oil use and CO2 emissions in China.

Vehicle Ownership Analysis Based on GDP per Capita in China: 1963–2050

“…The ultimate saturation level of Chinese vehicle ownership V China * was determined through the literature surveys [3,14,16], and we assumed a middle-growth scenario where the saturation level of vehicle ownership per 1000 people is 500. Sensitivity analysis on different ultimate saturation levels of vehicle ownership is undertaken in Section 4.…”

“…The forecast error bands around the forecasted value are calculated, which shows that the forecasted value stays within the bands with the probability of 68%. Compared with the literature, Huo et al [14] assume China's annual GDP growth rate to be 6.0%, 4.7%, 4.0%, and 3.0% during each decade from 2011 to 2050. Meyer et al [12] uses real GDP growth rate of China for the analysis, which decreases rapidly from 9% in 2010 to 2% in 2050.…”

“…The three scenarios applied in Zhao [17] generated the lowest vehicle ownership levels because the ultimate saturation level of vehicle ownership of China was set at 315 per 1000 people; this may have caused the absolute value of vehicle ownership projection by the Gompertz function in Equation (1). The assumptions of Huo et al [14] on the Chinese annual average GDP growth were overly pessimistic, resulting in lower vehicle ownership projections. However, Wang et al [40] generated a much higher vehicle ownership result than our results from 2010 to 2024.…”

“…Previous studies assumed an annual Chinese GDP growth rate of 6.0%, 4.7%, 4.0%, and 3.0% during each decade from 2011 to 2050 [14]. Here, we use a multiple autoregressive moving average (MARMA) model to forecast China's annual GDP growth rate, then undertake the empirical analysis based on this forecast results.…”

“…They also illustrated the characteristics of the Gompertz function for long-run vehicle ownership. Huo et al [14] used the Gompertz function to estimate the 2011-2050 Highway Vehicles (HWVs) stocks in China and projected three vehicle stock scenarios-high-growth, mid-growth and low-growth-by HWV saturation level. Zheng et al [16] used the Gompertz function to calculate county level vehicle ownership and found it to be reliable for simulating city-level vehicle growth patterns in China.…”