موجودی انتشار CO2 برای شهرهای چین در مناطق به شدت شهرنشین در مقایسه با شهرهای اروپا

The international literature has paid significant attention to presenting China as the largest emitter of greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the world, despite having much lower per-capita emissions than the global average. In fact, the imbalance of economic development leads to diversity in GHG emissions profiles in different areas of China. This paper employs a common methodology, consistent with the Sustainable Energy Action Plan (SEAP) approved by the Covenant of Mayors (CoM), to estimate CO2 emissions of four Chinese cities in highly urbanized areas from 2004 to 2010. The results show that the CO2 emissions of all four cities are still rising and that secondary industries emit the most CO2 in these cities. By comparing these data with the inventory results of two European cities, this paper further reveals that Chinese cities in highly urbanized areas contribute much higher per-capita emissions than their European competitors. Furthermore, the per-capita CO2 emissions of the residential sector and private transport in these Chinese cities are growing rapidly, some of them approaching the levels of European cities. According to these findings, several policy suggestions considering regional disparities are provided that aim to reduce the CO2 emissions of highly urbanized areas in China.

The statistical data from the IEA highlight China’s role as a global polluter, who has overtaken the United States in 2009 to become the world’s largest energy user, accounting for 17% of the world’s demand, and has been predicted to reach 22% of global demand by 2035 (IEA, 2010). This conclusion draws significant criticism on the Chinese government when the world community struggles to organize a post-Kyoto climate regime and achieve their promises with respect to climate change. China has announced its national emission reduction target till 2020 in the Copenhagen Climate Conference, however, it rejects accepting the Measurable, Reportable,Verifiable (MRV) principle by citing common but differentiated responsibility. Without an open and clear evaluation on its CO2 emission, it might be hard to convince the global community to believe China’s endeavors and achievements on carbon mitigation. Hence, it is significant to execute a research on emission inventories in China and compare the results with its global partners. A bewildered cognition about emissions volumes in China is useless to assist the right policy decision for curbing climate change. IEA considers the China’s emission issue from national perspective, while the opposing viewpoints of Chinese senior officials and some scholars asserts that, on a per capita basis, China's CO2 emissions of 3.9 t in 2005 are only one-fifth those for the U.S. (19.5 t). Neither national emissions nor per-capita emissions can precisely describe the status quo of GHG emissions in China, because China is such a gigantic country with a large land mass and huge population that it is misleading to view it as a monolithic entity (Huang and Todd, 2010). Significant intercity and regional disparities exist regarding economic development, industrial structure and energy usage, all of which are fundamental to the energy consumption differences between Eastern and Western China. Thus, studying China’s GHG emissions, especially CO2 emissions, at the city level considering regional disparities is important. Cities are recognized as playing a significant role in the global climate action, because they are the major sources of energy consumption based on their being centers of wealth and resources with high population densities. For example, in China, urban areas accounted for 75% of the national primary energy demand and 85% of the national commercial energy demand (Dhakal, 2009). Both the sources of GHGs and the opportunities for controlling their emissions exist at the local level (Wilbanks and Kates, 1999). Thus, cities should assume the responsibility for GHG emissions reduction to mitigate the effect of global climate change. To achieve this goal, quantifying the amount of CO2 generated by energy consumption, i.e., creating a CO2 emissions inventory for each city is an important first step. A number of studies have been carried out to investigate energy consumption and CO2 emissions in China, especially CO2 emissions, from a national perspective (Wei et al., 2006, Wang et al., 2010 and Zhang et al., 2009). Several of these studies focused on emissions from a sectoral perspective, such as the transport sector (Cai and Xie, 2007, Yan and Crookes, 2009 and Wang et al., 2007) and the building sector (Chen et al., 2008a and Chen et al., 2008b). Few studies have investigated cities’ emissions in China, and those that did so, such as Li et al. (2010), only explored the mega-cities. Although Dhakal (2009) produced a general snapshot of urban energy use in 35 Chinese cities, very few scholars have tried to evaluate overall CO2 emissions of Chinese cities as Kennedy et al. (2011) and his colleagues did for global cities and metropolitan regions. The lack of comparative emissions investigations in cities blurs the emission situation in China and obstructs the development of appropriate policies to fit the disparities among different regions in China. The main aim of this study is to estimate the CO2 emissions inventories of four Chinese cities in a typical region by collecting statistical data, analyzing the characteristics of emissions in recent years, and deducing future trends. Furthermore, after comparing results with emissions data for European cities in same period, this paper will propose several polices to assist Chinese cities in reaching their goal of switching to low-carbon development. The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. In the next section, we introduce an IPCC-based method by SEAP for estimating city CO2 emissions that has been widely used in Europe, discuss the data collection process, and employ this method for four Chinese cities. The main results of the emissions inventory are reported in Section 3, and the corresponding analyses are also presented. In Section 4, several policy implications are given according to the comparison between European and Chinese cities. Finally, several conclusions are drawn in Section 5.

This article selects an inventory method among several common global methodologies to estimate the CO2 emission level and utilizes it for four Chinese cities in a highly urbanized area from 2004 to 2010. The results show that the CO2 emission levels of these cities are still quickly increasing due to the rapid urbanization. Thus, the total CO2 emission level of China will continue to rise. Currently, industry is the largest contributor of CO2 emissions in Chinese cities, while the emission growth of non-industrial activities can no longer be ignored. Because of rapid economic growth, city development requires more energy, which causes both the city emissions and per capita emissions of some Chinese cities to exceed those of European cities. As coal is one of the primary energy sources for power generation in Chinese cities, the promotion of clean electricity will lessen the high level of dependence on fossil fuels and effectively reduce city emissions. The results of this study also suggest that the actions to mitigate the potential increase in the energy demand of the transport, residential and tertiary sectors are more significant than those to improve the energy efficiency in the industrial sector. The high rising energy consumption by these non-industrial activities in Chinese cities are totally generated by the need of local inhabitants, different with the industrial emissions which are most generated for international production and market. Currently, the huge energy demand for high accessibility in transport sector and quality living conditions in the residential sector fades the optimistic anticipation of the possibility for CO2 mitigation in China. Policies such as restricting the utilization of private vehicles and promoting the development of public transport could be beneficial in mitigating the rising trend of oil consumption in the transport sector. Through promoting the use of energy labels on electric appliances and buildings, the residential and tertiary sectors can effectively control the energy demand. Furthermore, the actions about the local energy-related infrastructures, such as electric grids, public lighting, and district heating and cooling networks, should be devised and executed immediately in order to improving the city energy efficiency in general. The development model for the Chinese city in future is significant for the entire world, in relation to the economic structure, ecological environment and many other issues. Although China belongs to Non-Annex I countries, Chinese cities should take effective actions to reduce their emission growth rate and mitigate their total emission increase as early as possible. Because of the geographic disparity of economic development in China, the goals and approaches for emission reduction used in Chinese cities should be differentiated. The cities in the highly urbanized eastern region can begin to conduct effective emission monitoring and reduction actions, while cities in other areas can observe and learn from these actions. Establishing a set of validated methodologies to inventory and monitor CO2 emissions is currently very important for Chinese cities. In general, the cities in highly urbanized areas are models for both economic development and energy consumption in China; therefore, their approach and actions on emissions reduction will not only influence all Chinese cities but also benefit the global community in addressing climate change.