Consumption-based emissions at city level in China and the spatial heterogeneity analysis of the influential factors

• Published in: Environmental science and pollution research international Vol. 30; no. 11; pp. 28961 - 28974
• Main Authors: Wang, Yuan, Pan, Zhou, Zhang, Lanxin, Lu, Yaling, Zhang, Zengkai, Ren, Jingzheng
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01.03.2023
• Subjects: Aquatic Pollution; Atmospheric Protection/Air Quality Control/Air Pollution; Carbon - analysis; Carbon Dioxide - analysis; China; Cities; Earth and Environmental Science; Economic Development; Ecotoxicology; Environment; Environmental Chemistry; Environmental Health; Environmental Monitoring; Environmental Pollutants - analysis; Research Article; Urbanization; Waste Water Technology; Water Management; Water Pollution Control; China; Spatial heterogeneity; Geographically weighted regression (GWR); Consumption-based emissions; Air pollutants; Multi-region input–output model (MRIO)
• ISSN: 1614-7499; 1614-7499
• DOI: 10.1007/s11356-022-24118-x

It is of great significance to identify the critical influential factors of pollutant emissions for emission mitigation. However, city disparity implies different priorities for regional mitigation. This study aims to estimate the consumption-based emissions of 309 prefecture-level cities in China based on the multi-region input–output table and the sectoral NOx emission inventory and investigate the emission transfer phenomenon among cities and sectors. In addition, a geographically weighted regression method is used to analyze the spatial heterogeneity in the driving factors of regional consumption-based emissions. The results reveal that the top 10 cities in consumption-based emissions account for 25.2% of emissions and contribute 22.6% to GDP. The consumption-based emissions are mainly driven by local demand (72.79%) at the regional level and by construction activities (94.43%) at the sectoral level. Besides, the results also show the spatial variances in contributions of driving forces to consumption-based emissions. Economic growth has been identified as the most important factor which promotes consumption-based emissions. However, disposable personal income, per capita road area, urbanization, and percentage of tertiary industry GDP are conducive to reduce consumption-based emissions in some cities of China. It could be concluded that policies without consideration of the emissions from a consumption perspective are difficult to achieve effective emission reduction.