Measuring Energy Efficiency in China’s Transport Sector

Abstract

Abstract:Energy efficiency is one of the key factors affecting energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. By focusing on China's transport sector, this study comprehensively reviews and compares the energy efficiency performance of passenger vehicles, light-duty commercial vehicles, commercial road transport, commercial water transport, aviation transport and railway transport, and identifies the opportunities for further energy efficiency improvements. It is found that railway transport exhibited the greatest improvement in energy efficiency during the past decade, which was mainly driven by progress in its electrification. Passenger vehicles have also experienced considerable energy efficiency improvements, which can be mainly attributed to the establishment of mandatory fuel consumption standards. In contrast, commercial road transport has shown the least improvement, due to insufficient policy implementations. Based on the analysis, it is recommended that, as China's present policy framework to improve energy efficiency in the transport sector is generally effective, it should be consistently maintained and successively improved. Electrification represents a major opportunity for improvement of energy efficiency in the transport sector. Such potential should be fully tapped for all transport modes. Greater effort should be put into improving the energy efficiency of commercial road transport. The policy instruments utilized to improve the energy efficiency of heavy-duty vehicles should be as intensive and effective as the policy instruments for passenger vehicles.

Examining the Factors Influencing Transport Sector CO2 Emissions and Their Efficiency in Central China

“…With the development of urbanization, some scholars began to explore the impact of urban form and urban land on traffic carbon emissions [7,8]. Most existing studies concentrate on the transport sector's CO 2 emissions at the national level [9,10], while others focus on megacities or east and south developed regions in China [8,11,12]. These studies ignore transport sector CO 2 emissions and the mitigation of such emissions in central China, despite central China being a transportation hub connecting the east and west.…”

Influencing Factors and Decoupling Elasticity of China’s Transportation Carbon Emissions

“…However, in the "Industrial classification for national economic activities of 2017", production of transportation goods belongs to the manufacturing industry, and the use of vehicles belongs to the transportation industry. This article uses the official classification, and the definition of the transportation industry in this paper is also widely used in other studies, such as Zhao et al [51], Wang et al [59], and Hao et al [12].…”

“…In this way, changes in per capita added value in the transportation industry are allocated to all of these indicators. Only part of its own change is due to changes in per capita added value and is calculated by Equation (12) in the impact on changes in carbon emissions. The remaining part is included in the impact of other indicators and accordingly adjusts the response level of the resulting indicator, Z.…”

“…Hao et al [12] comprehensively measured energy efficiency in China's transportation sector and identifies the opportunities for further energy efficiency improvements. Wei et al [13] discussed carbon dioxide abatement for 29 provinces in China, and concluded that industry composition, energy mix, openness degree affected carbon dioxide abatement potential.…”

“…. , X n dt; "+" refers to the generalized inverse matrix; Φ From Equation (12), the variation ∆Z of carbon emissions is divided into the sum of eight effects: ∆Z X 1 , ∆Z X 2 , ∆Z X 3 , ∆Z X 4 , ∆Z X 5 , ∆Z X 6 , ∆Z X 7 , and ∆Z X 8 . Among them, the three absolute factors ∆Z X 1 , ∆Z X 3 and ∆Z X 5 represent the impact of changes in the added value of transportation, changes in energy consumption and changes in the population size on carbon emissions in the transportation sector, respectively.…”