Discussion on the Mode of China＇s Low-carbon Society and Construction Routes

In responding to global climate change, the idea of low-carbon economy emerges as the times require. Developing low - carbon economy is based on the construction of low-carbon society. The so called ＂t...     

Impact of Climate Change on Urban Agglomerations in China’s Coastal Region

Climate change and urbanization issues are the two key factors that make humans liable to be affected by disasters, which are overlapped in urban agglomeration. The five big urban agglomerations of China with strong economic power are the important engines for national economic and social development. However, being in the sea-land mutual interaction belts with a vast hazard-bearing body, they are affected by sea-land compound disasters, and are liable to suffer heavy disaster losses with climate change. It is suggested that government departments concerned should fully recognize the impact of climate change on coastal urban agglomerations, propose strategies as soon as possible, and integrate the impact of climate change and adaptation countermeasures into the various kinds of social-economic development plans for coastal urban regions.     

An Empirical Study on the Environmental Kuznets Curve for China’s Carbon Emissions:Based on Provincial Panel Data

Based on the Environmental Kuznets Curve theory,the authors choose provincial panel data of China in 1990 2007 and adopt panel unit root and co-integration testing method to study whether there is Environmental Kuznets Curve for China’s carbon emissions.The research results show that:carbon emissions per capita of the eastern region and the central region of China fit into Environmental Kuznets Curve,but that of the western region does not.On this basis,the authors carry out scenario analysis on the occurrence time of the inflection point of carbon emissions per capita of different regions,and describe a specific time path.     

Spatial Variation and Space Optimization of the Development of China’s Circular Economy

China's circular economy is still at the initial stage, whose development has many difficulties and problems requiring immediate resolution theoretically and practically. Due to the differences of regions on the scale of land, endowment of resources, economic basis and cultural background, the developmental levels and capabilities of circular economy are inevitably different. Based on establishing the indicator system for assessing the developmental level of regional circular economy, spatial variation of China's circular economy is measured by the quantitative measurement using principal component analysis, and the existing problems are also analyzed and discussed. On one hand, the differences of the development capability of the circular economy of different provinces (cities) are profound in China; ①Difference between the first category (strong) and the second category (relatively strong) is 1.1264 points. Difference between the second category and the third category (relatively weak) is 0.3867 points. Difference between the third category and the fourth category (weak) is 1.0238 points. Difference between the first category and the fourth category reaches up to 2.0869 points. Average difference between the area where the developmental level of circular economy is relatively strong and the area where the developmental level of circular economy is relatively weak is 1.3617 points. ②The differences of the distribution of the areas, with different development capability of circular economy, which are located in the three economic regions of China, are also profound. The regions with a relatively strong development capability of circular economy are mainly located in the eastern economic area, which account for 22.58% of the whole regions, while only account for 12.90% in the middle and western economic areas. On the contrary, the regions with a relatively weak development capability of circular economy account for 48.39% in the middle and western area, while account for 16.13% in the eastern area. On the other hand, among regions with different development capability of circular economy, the regions with a relatively weak development capability of circular economy are in a dominant position, which accountfor 64.52% of all the provinces (cities), which indicates that the development of the China's circular economy still has a long way to go. Though certain achievements have been made in the development of China's circular economy, in general, there are still some obstacles to be tacked in the development of China's circular economy which require the economic, legal and administrative methods.     

Japan’s experience of energy saving and business model for low-carbon economy

The purpose of this paper is to clarify the questions concerning stimulation of the innovation and the diffusion of energy saving or low-carbon.To do so,this paper explains using two cases of Japan-energy saving innovation after the Oil Shock and the eco points system.For the case after the oil shock,we explain the energy saving trend after the Oil Shock and the factors statistically.Then we put forward the business model for the low-carbon economy.Furthermore,we analyze the case of the eco points system from 2009-2011 in Japan and explain the significance of the business model for diffusion of the low-carbon products.     

Research on challenges and strategies for China’s green economy development

The last 20 years have been the fastest economic developing period of China,and China has made great economic achievements through undertaking international industrial transfer.However,undertaking international industrial transfer has brought about severe environmental problems to China and the process of undertaking international industry transfer is also a process of undertaking international transfer of natural resource consumption and environmental pollution.Nowadays,China has the heaviest ecological burden and highest environmental risk in the world,and is gradually losing international competitive advantages among traditional industries.China is facing unprecedented pressure of economic transformation.Besides the advantages like huge domestic demands and abundant civil capital,China faces more challenges in its green economy development.First,China is still in the middle of industrialization and urbanization processes,hence the huge demands for traditional industries will only last 10-15 more years.Meanwhile,China lacks core technologies for transforming traditional industries,which means these industries will have high shut-down risks.Second,the domestic market share for new green industries is limited,since the market is dominated by traditional energy industries.Third,the value of land,water,mineral,and other natural resources is extremely underestimated because the environmental cost is excluded from the enterprises’cost-benefit calculation.China should foster and expand green industries based on domestic demands,and then strive for competitive advantages in the international market in the future.Therefore,China should focus on the following four points in order to promote green industry development:establishing a forced-upgrading-mechanism for traditional industries,an incentive-development-mechanism for new green industries and a TFP-based(total factor productivity based)economic development evaluation system;promoting the integration of new-type urbanization,new emerging industries,and new employments;taking the model of"technology innovating-patent formulating-standard establishing-market guiding"to enhance the global competitiveness of China’s new emerging industries;and building green consumption patterns in the whole society.     

Impacts of Suburbanization on Urban Eco-environment of Xi’an in China

Suburbanization in large cities is an important phenomenon in the process of urbanization development in China in recent decades,which plays a very important role in promoting city development,whereas some side effects on the eco-environment appeared at the same time.This paper,taking Xi’an City in China as a case study site,analyzed the features of population suburbanization and industry suburbanization and pointed out the impacts of suburbanization on urban eco-environment.Based on the research,suggestions of countermeasures for urban planning and municipal management of Xi’an City in protecting urban eco-environment and conserving natural ecology were put forward in the end.     

Analysis of CO2 emissions peak:China’s objective and strategy

Establishing positive and urgent targets for CO₂ reduction and emission peak,and promoting energy conservation and energy structure adjustment are among the strategies to address global climate change and CO₂ emissions reduction.They are also means to break through the constraints of domestic resources and environment,and internal needs,to achieve sustainable development.Generally speaking,a country’s CO₂ emission peak appears after achieving urbanization and industrialization.By then,connotative economic growth will appear,GDP will grow slowly,energy consumption elasticity will decrease,and energy consumption growth will slow down-dependent mainly on new and renewable energies.Fossil fuel consumption will not increase further.When CO₂ emission reaches its peak,the annual reduction rate of CO₂ intensity of GDP is greater than GDP annual growth rate;and the annual reduction rate of CO₂ intensity of energy use is greater than the annual growth rate of energy consumption.Therefore,three important approaches to promotion of CO₂ emission peak can be concluded:maintaining reasonable control of GDP growth,strengthening energy conservation to significantly reduce the GDP energy intensity,and optimizing the energy mix to reduce the CO₂ intensity of energy use.By around 2030,China will basically have completed its rapid development phase of industrialization and urbanization.Connotative economic growth will appear with the acceleration of industrial structure adjustment The target of GDP energy intensity will still be to maintain an average annual reduction of 3%or higher.The proportion of non-fossil fuels will reach 20-25%,and the aim will be to maintain an average annual growth rate of 6-8%.The total annual energy demand growth of 1.5%will be satisfied by the newly increased supply of non-fossil fuels.The annual decline in CO₂ intensity of GDP will reach 4.5%or higher,which is compatible with an average annual GDP growth     

Empirical analysis of carbon tariff’s effect on the export structure of China’s manufacturing industry and social welfare based on the GTAP model

In recent years, carbon emissions have gradually evolved from an environment issue into a political and economic one. Carbon tariff has brought about new trade barriers of developed countries, and in order to enhance the industrial competitiveness of developed countries, it will produce unfavorable impact on developing countries. Concentrated on the manufacturing industry, which is the most intensive high-carbon industry in China’s export structure, this article studies the relationship between carbon tariff policy and industry structure of export trade and builds up a relation between climate change and international trade. First, by means of establishing a partial equilibrium model, it applies geometric analysis and mathematical analysis to compute the impact on China’s manufacturing export trade and the consequences of the introduction of the US carbon tariff to China’s manufacturing industry that has already imposed a domestic shipping carbon tax. Furthermore, with the application of the GTAP model, it estimates the overall economic and welfare effects on China’s manufacturing industry if the US and Europe introduce carbon tariff by means of four ways, and then analyzes the influence on China’s manufacturing industry export structure and social welfare as well. The result shows that the introduction of the US carbon import tariff lowers China’s export price and export volume, and the implementation of a domestic carbon tax justifies a higher export price and a lower export volume for China. However, the degree of export reduction is smaller than that under the effect of the US carbon tariff. In the case of developed countries imposing carbon tariff on China’s energy-intensive industries, such as chemical rubber products, oil and coal-processing industry and paper industry, whose export would be reduced, the negative impact on the paper industry is the severest, which will decrease the paper industry’s export ranging from 1.79% to 6.05%, whereas the other industries’ export will increase. Anyhow, it will promote China’s manufacturing industry to adjust the export structure to a certain extent. In addition, it will lead to a decrease in China’s welfare, with a decrease between $2.134 billion and $8.347 billion. Finally, this paper provides information on international coordination, export structure adjustment and green manufacturing adjustment as a reference for the development of China’s manufacturing industry.     

A Simple Discussion on the Supply and Demand of Water Resources in the Western Region of China

We are accustomed to solve the problem of the water scarcity in the western region by the thought of increasing the effective supply of water to meet the needs of Go-west Campaign. After introducing the dynamic equilibrium principle on supply and demand in economy, we find that we should solve the problem of the water scarcity in the western region through reducing total demand to achieve the dynamic equilibrium of supply and demand. Finally water resources in the western region can be enlarged by an accumulated way.     

Research on the effects of command-and-control and market-oriented policy tools on China’s energy conservation and emissions reduction innovation

The impact of environmental regulation on technology innovation is a hot spot in current research where a large number of empirical studies are based on Porter Hypothesis (PH). However, there are still controversies in academia about the establishment of “weak” and “narrow” versions of PH. Based on the panel data of application for patent of energy conservation and emission reduction (ECER) technology of Chinese city scale during 2008–2014, comprehensive energy price, pollutant emission, etc., mixed regression model and systematic generalized method of moments method were adopted, respectively, to study the impact of market-oriented and command-and-control policy tool on China’s ECER technology innovation. The results show that the environmental regulation hindered the technological innovation in the immediate phase; however, it turned out to be positive in the first-lag phase. Hence, the establishment of “weak” PH is time-bounded. The command-and-control policy tool played a more positive role in promoting technological innovation in the first-lag phase than market-oriented policy tool. Therefore, “narrow” PH is not tenable. The reason is that the main participants of China’s ECER technology innovation are state-owned companies and public institutions. Regionally speaking, the impact which command-and-control policy tool has on technological innovation at sight was non-significant in the eastern, the central, and the western regions of China whilst market-oriented policy tool had a negative effect. And market-oriented policy tool in the central region had strongest negative effect, which would diminish in the eastern region and become weakest in the western region. This was related to regional energy consumption level and the market economic vitality.     

Amazonian forest loss and the long reach of China’s influence

This paper explores China’s role in deforestation in Latin America. Brazil’s Amazon region contains vast natural resources including land, timber, minerals and hydroelectric potential. China’s strong economy and large demands relative to domestic supplies of these resources mean that China has become Brazil’s largest trading partner, primarily for natural resources. The paper examines how China influences deforestation in Brazilian Amazonia in a variety of ways, including through the direct influence of Chinese enterprises through land purchases and other mechanisms. This paper finds that the rapid rise in exports of soy and beef products to China are two of the major drivers of Amazonian deforestation in Brazil. The paper further argues that Chinese purchases of agricultural and forest land and Chinese imports of commodities such as timber and aluminum also cause environmental impacts in Amazonia. Chinese financing and investment in Amazonian infrastructure such as railways and mineral processing facilities have additional impacts.     

Evaluation on the development degree of China’s seven pilot carbon markets

China is preparing to establish a nationwide carbon market in 2017, and in order to facilitate this goal, seven pilot carbon markets have been under study for the past few years. This paper summarizes the operation experience and challenges of the seven pilot carbon markets in China. It has been widely accepted that the essence of a carbon market is to solve environmental problems through market mechanisms, with environmental benefit being the fundamental purpose, market mechanism being the key measure, and policies and regulations being an important guarantee for an orderly carbon market. Therefore, this paper constructs an evaluation index system composed of 34 detailed sub-indexes in three dimensions, such as environmental constraint force, market resource allocation ability, and supporting policies and facility completeness. Through analyzing the operation data from 2013 to 2016, the weights of the sub-indexes are obtained. In addition, the study obtains experts’ opinions from over 10 carbon permits exchanges, consultancy firms and research institutions in China, and conducts a comprehensive evaluation on the development degree of the seven pilot carbon markets. Results show that the pilot carbon markets that include private SMEs as the covered entities for emissions control present relatively higher environmental constraint force. But too many covered entities could increase the difficulty of market performance management, while the pilots that include high energy-consuming state-owned enterprises as the entities for emissions control demonstrate a phenomenon of “high market compliance rate with low trading volume”. The resource allocation capability of China’s carbon market has not been effectively brought into play, and low degree of market participation has become an important constraint factor for market development. Due to the lack of laws and regulations at the national macro-level, the legally binding force of the pilot markets construction is obviously insufficient, and the supporting policies are lacking foresights. Generally, the development of China’s pilot carbon markets is still in such a fragmented state as in the aspects of environment, market and policy development, and the market operation has not yet achieved the purpose of solving environmental problems through market mechanisms. Accordingly, policy recommendations pointed out by this study are that tightening the allowance of free quota and progressively increasing the auction proportion, improving legal construction, increasing the services and products of carbon finance and standardizing the order of market transactions, enhancing capacity building of local governments and promoting the participation willingness and capability of emissions control entities, will be necessary.     

Study on the efficiency and regional disparity of green technology innovation in China’s industrial companies

This paper first constructed a system to evaluate the innovation efficiency of industrial companies within Mainland China. Then, a principal component analysis (PCA) was performed to these indicators for dimensionality reduction, so as to figure out the technology innovation efficiency in these two phases, respectively. Finally, the overall efficiency of industrial companies in different regions was estimated and factorized via data envelopment analysis (DEA). The results showed that: (1) the efficiency of green technology innovation of industrial companies in China was relatively low as a whole, which mainly resulted from pure technical efficiency (PTE). Further, this huge gap continues to expand in these regions. And both PTE and scale efficiency (SE) in central and western regions leave much to be expected. (2) In the first phase of green technology development, when environmental factors were concerned, the efficiency was much lower than that without environmental considerations. Besides, the central and western regions were facing increasingly severe environmental problems, and there was a wide disparity in technology development efficiency among eastern, central, and western regions. (3) In the second phase of green technology commercialization, there were still more rooms for improvement in raising the efficiency of green technology innovation, and the efficiency in eastern, central, and western regions was ranked from highest to lowest. (4) Liaoning, Hebei, Heilongjiang, Xinjiang, Shanxi, Inner Mongolia, Yunnan, and Qinghai should focus on improving their technology; Jilin, Jiangxi, Anhui, and Guangxi should make their efforts to reduce resource redundancy; whereas Ningxia and Gansu should try to solve the above two issues.     

Can regional economy influence China’s water use intensity?:based on refined LMDI method

China experienced a decline of water use intensity in the 11th Five Year Plan,but the water use intensity actually increased in 2009.To the best of our knowledge,the index decomposition analysis method was rarely used to analyze changes in water use,and no decomposition analysis has investigated the role of regional economy in the decline of water use intensity.In this paper,we use logarithmic mean Divisia index(LMDI)techniques to decompose the change of water use intensity in the period 2006-2010.We find that the change of industrial water use intensity is confirmed as the dominant contributor to the decline in the overall water use intensity;the regional structure effect and the industrial structure effect is positive to the decline of overall water use intensity;the decline of China’s water use intensity is mainly attributed to the effect of developed eastern provinces;meanwhile,the effect of central and undeveloped western is also positive to the decline of overall water use intensity;at least one out of three effects is positive to the decline of water use intensity in the different provinces;the intensity effect is positive and the industrial structure effect is positive to the declines of China’s water use intensity based on chaining approach except the period 2008-2009,individually;and the deviation of regional structure effect and industrial structure effect between with regional economy and without regional economy in LMDI is 0.9 and2.3 m~3/10~4 RMB,respectively.     

China’s Import of Wastes and Its Implications

The trade of wastes in the world has been increasing and China has become the largest importer of wastes. This paper examines the import trend of different wastes and finds out that the total import volume to China approved by the Chinese government keeps increasing and the illegal trade can not be banned despite repeated prohibitions; therefore, China is not only ＂a world factory＂, but actually ＂a global garbage dump＂. In order to well understand the implications of wastes import, this paper further analyzes the resource and environmental effects and risks of different wastes imports as well as the strong driving force of wastes imports. Based on these detailed analysis and solid data, policy recommendations are put forward to reduce the demand for raw materials, to further strengthen the inspection of and supervision over the international trade of the wastes that can be used as raw materials by using the life cycle analysis and risk analysis, to improve the environmental standards and strengthen the disposal capacity, to re-export the raw materials produced from the imported wastes, to develop the long-term planning for the import of wastes and to promote international cooperation.     

Spatial Variation and Space Optimization of the Development of China’s Circular Economy

Abstract

China’s circular economy is still at the initial stage, whose development has many difficulties and problems requiring immediate resolution theoretically and practically. Due to the differences of regions on the scale of land, endowment of resources, economic basis and cultural background, the developmental levels and capabilities of circular economy are inevitably different. Based on establishing the indicator system for assessing the developmental level of regional circular economy, spatial variation of China’s circular economy is measured by the quantitative measurement using principal component analysis, and the existing problems are also analyzed and discussed. On one hand, the differences of the development capability of the circular economy of different provinces (cities) are profound in China; Difference between the first category (strong) and the second category (relatively strong) is 1.1264 points. Difference between the second category and the third category (relatively weak) is 0.3867 points. Difference between the third category and the fourth category (weak) is 1.0238 points. Difference between the first category and the fourth category reaches up to 2.0869 points. Average difference between the area where the developmental level of circular economy is relatively strong and the area where the developmental level of circular economy is relatively weak is 1.3617 points. The differences of the distribution of the areas, with different development capability of circular economy, which are located in the three economic regions of China, are also profound. The regions with a relatively strong development capability of circular economy are mainly located in the eastern economic area, which account for 22.58% of the whole regions, while only account for 12.90% in the middle and western economic areas. On the contrary, the regions with a relatively weak development capability of circular economy account for 48.39% in the middle and western area, while account for 16.13% in the eastern area. On the other hand, among regions with different development capability of circular economy, the regions with a relatively weak development capability of circular economy are in a dominant position, which account for 64.52% of all the provinces (cities), which indicates that the development of the China’s circular economy still has a long way to go. Though certain achievements have been made in the development of China’s circular economy, in general, there are still some obstacles to be tacked in the development of China’s circular economy which require the economic, legal and administrative methods.     

Threshold effects of tourism agglomeration on the green innovation efficiency of China’s tourism industry

ABSTRACT

Industrial agglomeration is an essential and effective way to integrate resources and elements. Its impact on the green innovation efficiency of the tourism industry is a process of continuous development and dynamic change. This paper, based on the provincial panel data from 2006 to 2015, uses super SBM model to measure the green innovation efficiency of China’s tourism industry. The threshold regression model is employed to conduct empirical tests of the nonlinear threshold effect of agglomeration on the green innovation efficiency of tourism industry. The inter-provincial differences of various threshold effects and their possible causes are analyzed. Results indicate that the green innovation efficiency of China’s tourism industry is generally growing, while regional disparity is significant with a gradient decrease along the eastern-central-western regions. There is an obvious positive nonlinear relationship between tourism agglomeration and green innovation efficiency. It is also found that with the increase of agglomeration, its influence is at a high level. As the level of agglomeration crosses the first threshold, its impact is at a low level, and when it crosses the second threshold, the impact of tourism agglomeration is at an intermediate level. Finally, this paper proposes the basic path and some policy recommendations to promote the green innovation efficiency of the tourism industry in China.     

Influences of Border Carbon Adjustments on China’s Foreign Trade

The EU, the United States and other economies, with the intention to implement unilateral trade measures Border Carbon Adjustments, impose emission reduction pressure on developing countries. Once implemented, the measures will have great impact on China’s foreign trade. Using the input-output table in 2007, this paper had analyzed the influences on China’s foreign trade as a whole and sub-sectors in three tax rates scenarios. The results showed that the tariff level of China’s exports will increase by 3.6%-6.3% if the tax was levied on exports embodied emissions, and by 1.0%-1.7% if levied on export direct emissions. In 2007, the former total amount of carbon tax was about US$42.6-73.0 billion, 4 times that of the latter. Based on export embodied emissions, sectors largely influenced were non-traditional energy intensive ones, such as textile, et al. These sectors should be encour-aged to carry out industrial upgrading, raising the value-added of export goods, and reducing their embodied emissions by reduction of energy intensity. Taking into account of the complexity of data collection, the tax levied on products direct emission is more operational. The results showed that the five top sectors most affected were other chemical materials, processing of petroleum and nuclear fuel, coking, smelting and rolling of ferrous metal and textile. Most of them were energy intensive sectors. Therefore, adjusting export products structure, and controlling too fast development of energy intensive industries are also important strategies in China.     

A study on marine industry and environment of China: regarding Japan’s experience

China is facing the challenge of many marine environment problems with rapid economic growth. Japan had experienced similar marine environmental pressure during its industrialization and had been facing the problem through successful environment policy step by step. The paper reviews the lessons and experiences of Japan’s marine environment protection and analyzes the marine environment pollution in China and its causes, taking Shandong province as a case, such as GDP-oriented economic growth, heavy coal assumption, etc. The paper also analyzes the marine industry with focuses on coastal tourism and its relationship with marine environment. Suggestions on polices are provided based on the analysis on China’ marine environment and Japan’s experience.