Research on carbon emissions in China's export trade based on input-output model

Becoming the world’s largest emitter of carbon makes China the object of criticism;however,people may ignore the fact that when China exports low-carbon products,the carbon emissions have been left in the meanwhile,forming the so-called"embodied carbon".Using the input-output model,this paper analyzes the carbon emission intensity and amount of embodied carbon of various sectors in China’s export trade in 2002 and 2007,and filters out high carbon emission sectors.In addition,this paper also points out the problem of carbon emissions’international transfer from developed countries to China through the analysis of national and regional flow of export carbon emissions and changing of the proportion of emissions for exports relative to total emissions,and explains the reason that caused carbon transfer to China by using the treadmill of production theory.Based on that,this paper proposes some measures for carbon reduction in China from the foreign trade perspective.     

China’s Export Expansion, Export Structure and Energy Consumption

Since the reform and opening up,China’s export trade has maintained a rapid growth;meanwhile,China’s energy consumption has been increasing sharply. "High export and high energy consumption" has become the feature of China’s trade and economic development.In this paper,based on the input-output analysis approach,the authors have conducted an empirical study on the export trade and energy consumption of 21 trade industrial sectors.The results show that,China is a big net exporter of embodied energy.Assuming that the export growth rate of embodied energy maintains to be about 23.6%,the average annual growth rate of the past 32 years,and based on the input-output data of 2005,by 2030 China’s net export of embodied energy would be over eight times more than the aggregate energy production,which is obviously infeasible.As a country of very low per capita energy,China must change its export pattern,encourage or restrain the export of different industrial sectors according to their energy consumption intensity,and promote structural change of energy-efficient exported products,so as to achieve the sustainable development.Accordingly,the authors put forward some suggestions.     

Energy Embodied in Goods in International Trade of China: Calculation and Policy Implications

In recent years, China’s energy demand and Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have grown very fast, quite an amount of which was exported as energy embodied in goods in international trade rather than consumed domestically. Starting from the concept of embodied energy, based on input-output energy analysis approach, in this paper the energy embodied in goods in international trade of China during the period from 2001 to 2006 is calculated. The results show that although China has become a net importer of petroleum since 1993, China is a net exporter of embodied energy due to international trade in goods. In 2002, the total amount of energy embodied in exported goods was about 410 million tce (ton of coal equivalent, hereinafter referred to as "tce"). Eliminating the amount of energy embodied in imported goods of about 170 million tce, the net export of embodied energy was about 240 million tce, accounting for 16% of the aggregate primary energy consumption of that very year in China, and the net export of embodied emissions was about 150 million tons of carbon. With the rapid growth of China’s international trade, assuming no structural input-output changes of among sectors, in 2006 the net export of embodied energy went up to about 630 million tce, an increase of 162 % over 2002. In addition, this paper also analyzes the possible sources of error in calculation, and also discusses the policy implications according to the result of the calculation.     

Analysis of the Energy Embodied in Foreign Goods Trade of China

In recent years, scientists have been increasingly interested in the energy embodied in traded goods among countries. In this article, the direct energy intensities in various economic sectors of China were calculated with the data of energy consumption and output value of each sector, and the input-output table was used to estimate the external energy consumption. The total energy intensity of all sectors was then obtained. From the data of international trade, the energy embodied in goods trade of China was estimated for the period of 1994-2001. During this period, the average energy intensity of imported goods was always higher than that of exported ones. As a country with a surplus in international goods trade, China actually imported net embodied energy in the past few years. The net embodied energy imported was at the same magnitude of the imported energy in the form of fossil fuels.     

Carbon price impacts on sector cost:based on an input-output model of Beijing

Under the pressure of sustained growth in energy consumption in China,the implementation of a carbon pricing mechanism is an effective economic policy measure for promoting emission reduction,as well as a hotspot of research among scholars and policy makers.In this paper,the effects of carbon prices on Beijing’s economy are analyzed using input-output tables.The carbon price costs are levied in accordance with the products’embodied carbon emission.By calculation,given the carbon price rate of 10 RMB/t-CO₂,the total carbon costs of Beijing account for approximately 0.22-0.40%of its gross revenue the same year.Among all industries,construction bears the largest carbon cost Among export sectors,the coal mining and washing industry has much higher export carbon price intensity than other industries.Apart from traditional energy-intensive industries,tertiary industry,which accounts for more than 70%of Beijing’s economy,also bears a major carbon cost because of its large economic size.However,from 2007 to 2010,adjustment of the investment structure has reduced the emission intensity in investment sectors,contributing to the reduction of overall emissions and carbon price intensity.     

Empirically Analysis of the CO2 Emissions Embodied in Exports of China

In this paper,using the input-output model,the author first calculated the CO 2 emissions embodied in exports of China in 2002 and 2007.Then,the author empirically analyzed problems existing in the composition of exported products and analyzed its possible reasons.The research results of this paper are as follows:Since China’s entry into WTO,the CO 2 emissions embodied in exports of China have been increasing rapidly;the value of exported products of high-carbon emissions industries accounts for a relatively higher proportion to China’s total exports value because China’s carbon intensive products have a certain competitive advantage.Additionally,this paper has put forward relevant suggestions based on these results.     

Analysis of transportation carbon emissions and its potential for reduction in China

The transportation industry is an essential sector for carbon emissions mitigation.This paper firstly used the LMDI(Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index)decomposition method to establish factors decomposition model on China’s transportation carbon emission.Then,a quantitative analysis was performed to study the factors influencing China’s transportation carbon emissions from 1991 to 2008,which are identified as transportation energy efficiency,transportation structure and transportation development.The results showed that:(1)The impact of transportation development on transportation carbon emissions showed pulling function.Its contribution value to carbon emissions remained at high growth since 1991 and showed an exponential growth trend.(2)The impact of transportation structure on transportation carbon emissions showed promoting function in general,but its role in promoting carbon emissions decreased year by year.And with the continuous optimization of transportation structure,the promoting effect decreased gradually and showed the inversed"U"trend.(3)The impact of transportation energy efficiency on transportation carbon emissions showed a function of inhibition before pulling.In order to predict the potential of carbon emission reduction,three scenarios were set.Analysis of the scenarios showed that if greater intensity emission reduction measures are taken,the carbon emissions will reduce by 31.01 million tons by 2015 and by 48.81 million tons by 2020.     

CGE Simulation for Levying Carbon Tax in China and International Experience of Levying Carbon Tax

Levying carbon tax is conducive to reducing carbon dioxide emissions and protecting the environment.The author firstly reviewed some relevant empirical studies on carbon tax both home and abroad,and then established the CGE model and simulated levying carbon tax in China.The study found that levying carbon tax would have little impact on China’s economy:in a short-term,China’s GDP might decrease by 0.51%,while in a long-term it might decrease by 0.08%;however,the carbon dioxide emissions would be substantially reduced.Meanwhile,levying carbon tax has some negative impact on the output of each industry in the very economic structure;of this,the mineral extractive industries would be influenced the most.Then the author summarized experience of levying carbon tax in foreign countries.     

International trade,carbon leakage,and CO2 emissions of manufacturing industry

Foreign trade drives China’s growth,but as the trade scale continues to expand,the carbon emissions also increase quickly.Based on the industry panel data from 1996 to 2010,this paper calculates carbon emissions of 27manufacturing industries.According to the intensity of carbon emissions,this paper divides the manufacturing sectors into low carbon and high carbon manufacturing industry and then analyzes the carbon emission trends.Next,the paper uses the feasible generalized least square regression to verify the existence of environmental Kuznets curve（EKC）of the manufacturing industry’s carbon.In order to investigate the carbon leakage problem,the regression also includes the interaction term between trade and industrial value added.Our findings are as follows:the carbon emissions of the whole manufacturing industry and low carbon manufacturing industry accord with the EKC curve,but have a linear relationship with the high carbon manufacturing industry;trade reduces the carbon emissions of the whole manufacturing industry and low carbon manufacturing industry,but it increases those of the high carbon manufacturing industry;for the whole manufacturing industry and low carbon manufacturing industry,there is no carbon leakage,but it exists in the high carbon manufacturing industry.On the whole,pollution haven hypothesis does not hold up in China,and China does not need to limit industry foreign trade to reduce the emission of CO₂.But the manufacturing industry will still be the main engine of the economic growth,and therefore our country should make an effective low-carbon policy,introduce advanced technology,increase R&D investment into lowcarbon technologies,and upgrade and transform the original equipment to change the backward mode of production.     

Decomposition of Energy-related CO2 Emissions from Shanghai＇s Industries and Policy Implications

This paper quantifies a decomposition analysis of energy-related CO2 emissions in the industrial sectors of Shanghai over the period 1994-2007.The Log-Mean Divisia Index(LMDI) method is applied to this study in terms of six factors:labor force,labor mobility,gross labor productivity,energy intensity,fuel mix,and emission coefficient.In addition,the decoupling effect between industrial economic growth and CO2 emissions is analyzed to evaluate CO2 mitigation strategies for Shanghai.The results show that all labor productivity has the largest positive effect on CO2 emission changes in the industrial sectors,whereas labor mobility and energy intensity are the main components for decreasing CO2 emissions.Other factors have different effects on CO2 mitigation in different sub-periods.Although a relative decoupling of industrial CO2 emissions from the economic growth in Shanghai has been found,Shanghai should keep pace with the industrial CO2 emissions reduction by implementing low-carbon technology.These results have important policy implications:Plan C is the reasonable choice for Shanghai.     

Scenario Formation of Energy Demand and CO_2 Emissions for Sustainable China

Co-integration theory has been employed in this paper and Granger causes are found between urbanization rate and GDP, between capital stock and GDP. Scenario analysis of GDP is performed using the GDP model established in the paper. The energy consumptions in Germany, Japan and other developed countries are analyzed and compared with the energy consumption in China. Environmental friendly scenario of energy demand and CO2 emissions for sustainable China has been formed based on the results of comparison. Under environmental friendly scenario, the primary energy consumption will be 4.31 billion ton coal equivalence （tee） and CO2 emissions will be 1.854 billion t-c in 2050; energy per capital will be 3.06 tee that is 1.8 times of energy consumed in 2005 in China and 51% of consumed energy per capital in Japan in 2003. In 2050, the energy requirement of unit GDP will be 20% lower than that of Germany in 2003, but will be still 37% higher than that in Japan in 2003. It is certain that to fulfill the environmental friendly Scenario of energy demand and CO2 emissions is a difficult task and it needs long term efforts of the whole society, not only in production sectors but also in service and household sectors,     

China's Voluntary Mitigation Target and Road of Low-carbon Development

China is going through a rapid development stage of industrialization and urbanization.Although tremendous achievements have been made in the aspects of energy conservation,improvement of energy effectiveness and development of new and renewable energies,because of the rapid development of economy,it is difficult to change the huge total amount and fast increase of CO2 emission in the near future.China has to confront the tough challenge to address global climate change.China plans to reduce carbon intensity,that is,CO2 emissions per unit GDP,by 40 to 45% by 2020 compared with the 2005 level.It is a strategic option to coordinate domestic sustainable development with coping with global climate change on the basis of China’s national circumstances,representing the core content and key measures for transforming development pattern and realizing low-carbon development.To achieve the target,more capital and technology inputs are required for energy conservation and low-carbon development during the twelfth and Thirteenth Five Year Plan period than in the Eleventh Five Year Plan period.In addition,energy conservation achieved by structural adjustment,industrial upgrading and product value-added improvement is also expected to play a greater role.Therefore,China should strengthen technological innovation,make greater efforts to transform the development pattern,take advantage of the synergistic effect of policies and measures while coping with global climate change and building a domestic tow-oriented society.China should also establish an industrial system characterized by low-carbon emission.Then China will ultimately achieve a win-win situation in both domestic sustainable development and coping with global climate change.     

Sustainable Development of Export： Theoretical Meaning, Evaluation Model, and Empirical Research

With the effect of the human trade doctrine in the international trade field, almost all the countries have paid more attention to the sustainable development of international trade. This article chose the export sustainable development as the research object. On the basis of the analysis of the theoretical connotation of the export sustainable development, this article tried to establish an evaluation indices system and set up an evaluation model of the export sustainable development level, and finally made some empirical research on China. The result indicates that the comprehensive level of the export sustainable development in China showed a tendency to rise from 1985 to 2003 and the export sustainable development level of China in these years can be divided into four grades： excellent, good, moderate and poor. In most years, the social economic benefits of export was obtained at the cost of the deterioration of environment and the depletion of resources, and the economic profit of export did not increase with the enlargement of the export scale because of the deterioration of the terms of trade. Therefore, China should be careful about the problem of poverty accompanied by the increase of export.     

CO_2 Emissions Embodied in China-U.S.Trade

After the Kyoto Protocol was implemented, carbon leakage exerts great influences on international trade and economy. Trade creates a mechanism for consumers to shift environmental pollution associated with their consumption to other countries. China has overtaken the U.S. as the world＇s biggest CO2 emitter since 2006. As China＇s second largest trade partner, the U.S. has the biggest trade deficit with China which has aroused a lot of disputes between the two parties. But so far the assessments of the trade imbalance of China-U.S. have paid little attention to environmental impacts associated with the trade imbalance. Applied an input-output approach, the article estimates the amount of CO2 embodied in China-U.S. trade during 1997-2007. It was found that through trade with China, the U.S. reduced its CO2 emissions compared with a non-trade scenario. Due to the greater carbon-intensity and relatively less efficient production processes of Chinese industry, China-U.S. trade resulted in more CO2 emissions in China and the world. In the end, the article gives some suggestions： it is equal and sustainable that the international accounting methodologies should be improved, for CO2 emissions responsibility must be designed to account for the dynamic nature of international trade.     

Has EU ETS caused carbon leakage in the EU carbon-intensive industries?A study from the perspective of bilateral trade

Reducing carbon leakage is one of the important reasons that was put forward by the EU for their border adjustment tax proposal.However,there are not many empirical evidences supporting significant carbon leakage in the EU carbonintensive industries.This paper applied the structural breakpoint test for the time series of import and export of cement,aluminum,and steel between EU and China.No significant structural changes were detected in the import and export of cement and aluminum.However,there proved to be two breakpoints,i.e.,2003 and 2008,in the import and export of steel,in which at the second point the overall level of steel import increased.Furthermore,Granger causality test was applied to the carbon price from European Climate Exchange and the import and export of steel.It was found that the carbon price was the Granger cause for the changes of steel import,but not the Granger cause for the export.The results of the study showed that the impacts of EU ETS on the EU carbon-intensive industries were limited.Among the three industries,partial evidence of carbon leakage was only found in the steel industry.Therefore,reducing carbon leakage could not serve as a convincing justification for border adjustment tax.     

The Factor Decomposition on Carbon Emission of China——Based on LMDI Decomposition Technology

Carbon emission is the current hot issue of global concern. How to assess various contributing factors for carbon emission is of great importance to find out the key factors and promote carbon emission reduction. In this paper, the author constructs an identical equation for carbon emission, based on the economic aggregate, the economic structure, the efficiency of energy utilization, the structure of energy consumption, and the coefficient of carbon emission; by applying to LMDI decomposition technology, the author analyzes the carbon emission of China from 1995 to 2007 at industrial level and regional level. The results show that the expansion of economic aggregate is the main reason for China’ s rapidly increasing carbon emission and the increase of energy utilization efficiency is the key factor that can hold back the increase of carbon emission. In addition, the change of industrial structure or regional structure and the change of traditional energy structure have limited influence on the carbon emission, and their potentials have not yet been exploited. At the end of this paper, the author proposes the efforts that China should make to reduce carbon emission.     

Pollutant emissions,energy consumption and economic development in China:Evidence from dynamic panel data

This study investigates the relationship among pollutant emissions,energy consumption and economic development in China during the period 1982-2007 by using a one-step GMM-system model under a multivariable panel VAR framework,controlling for capital stock and labor force.Regarding the data for all 28 provinces as a whole,we find that there is a unidirectional positive relationship running from pollutant emission to economic development and a unidirectional negative relationship between pollutant emission and energy consumption.Based on traditional economic planning,the panel data of28 provinces are divided into two cross-province groups.It is discovered that in the eastern coastal region of China,there is only a unidirectional positive causal relationship leading from economic development to pollutant emission;while in the central and western regions,there are the unidirectional Granger causal relationships between pollutant emission and energy consumption,as well as between pollutant emission and economic development.There is also a unique unidirectional causal relationship running from economic development to energy consumption,which does not appear in the eastem coastal region or in China as a whole.     

Dynamic Changes, Regional Differences, and Influencing Factors of CO2 Emission Performance in China

This paper proposes to use DEA models with undesirable outputs to construct the Malmquist index that can be use to investigate the dynamic changes of CO 2 emission performance.With the index,the authors have measured the CO 2 emission performance of 28 provinces and autonomous regions in China from 1996 to 2007;with the convergence theory and panel data regression model,the authors analyze the regional differences and the influencing factors.It is found that the performance of CO 2 emissions in China has been continuously improved mainly due to the technological progress,and the average improvement rate is 3.25%,with a cumulative improvement rate of 40.86%.In addition,the CO 2 emission performance varies across four regions.As a whole,the performance score of eastern China is the highest.The northeastern and central China has relatively lower performance scores,and the western China is relatively backward.The regional differences are decreasing,and the performance of CO 2 emissions is convergent.The influence of some factors on the performance of CO 2 emissions is significant,such as the level of economic development,the level of industrial structure,energy intensity,and ownership structure.The influence of some factors,such as opening-up to the outside world,on the performance of CO 2 emissions is not significant..     

Conflict and Coordination Problem of Carbon Tax’ Diversity Targets in China-Based on the Tax Optimization Theory

Among all the emission reduction measures,carbon tax is recognized as the most effective way to protect our climate.That is why the Chinese government has recently taken it as a tax reform direction.In the current economic analysis,the design of carbon tax is mostly based on the target to maximize the efficiency.However,based on the theory of tax system optimization,we should also consider other policy objectives,such as equity,revenue and cost,and then balance different objectives to achieve the suboptimum reform of carbon tax system in China.     

Effect analysis of carbon trading on Economy-Energy-Environment system and calculation of reasonable carbon price intervals

This paper constructs a 4-lier computable general equilibrium model which includes such modules as modeling carbon emission constraints and carbon trading(CT),and incorporates the cost of carbon emissions into constant elasticity of substitute production function.Under scenario settings under different carbon abatement targets,based on 2007 national social accounting matrix and related statistical data about energy consumption and carbon emission,effects on economic outputs,energy consumption,and carbon abatement are estimated and analyzed at both macro and sector level.By calculating selected novel indicators that compromise between macroeconomic opportunity cost and achievable carbon abatement,reasonable carbon price intervals are given for enhancing the robustness and liquidity of carbon market.Further,by decomposition and share-weighted methods,expected carbon abatement and energy price are measured and analyzed in details.Some results are meaningful for fundamental design of the future carbon market.Given constant energy utilization and carbon abatement technologies at the macro level,the higher the carbon price the more actual carbon abatement;the more gross domestic product loss,the less energy consumption.Accwding to the overall situation estimated for 2007 in China,the advice given is to introduce a carbon abatement target rate(R_c)of-10%,which is helpful to make carbon market stable against unexpected carbon price shocks between[6.9,35]/tC with less economic loss.According to Kaya decomposition,after introduction of carbon pricing,carbon abatement is mainly contributed by the effects of energy intensity(EI)and technical progress.Further,CT may help reduce energy consumption and induce transformation to a low-carbon energy structure.At the sector level,the introduction of CT could induce economic recession in all sectors,especially energy.However,the overall economic structure remains unchanged to some extent.CT will help reduce energy consumption in all sectors,especially energy.Overall utilization costs of the energy composite can be divided in two,market price and carbonrelated costs.Carbon-related costs mainly contribute to variation in the utilization cos of the energy composite;carbon pricing may help non-energy sectors achieve sufficient carbon abatement by pushing up energy utilization cost.However,despite achievable carbon abatement by the energy sector being relatively high,induced by carbon pricing,there is still significant potential for other incentive policies to stimulate further abatement,such as energy resources taxation and transportation fuel taxation,especially in the sectors of coal and transportation.Finally,some advice is proposed in regard to policy decisions and further research.