Peaking China’s CO2 Emissions: Trends to 2030 and Mitigation Potential

Abstract

China has submitted its nationally determined contribution to peak its energy-related emissions around 2030. To understand how China might develop its economy while controlling CO 2 emissions, this study surveys a number of recent modeling scenarios that project the country's economic growth, energy mix, and associated emissions until 2050. Our analysis suggests that China's CO 2 emissions will continue to grow until 2040 or 2050 and will approximately double their 2010 level without additional policy intervention. The alternative scenario, however, suggests that peaking CO 2 emissions around 2030 requires the emission growth rate to be reduced by 2% below the reference level. This step would result in a plateau in China's emissions from 2020 to 2030. This paper also proposed a deep de-carbonization pathway for China that is consistent with China's goal of peaking emissions by around 2030, which can best be achieved through a combination of improvements in energy and carbon intensities. Our analysis also indicated that the potential for energy intensity decline will be limited over time. Thus, the peaking will be largely dependent on the share of non-fossil fuel energy in primary energy consumption.

Achieving China's energy and climate policy targets in 2030 under multiple uncertainties

“…Although some previous research works have explored China's energy and carbon emission projections in the medium and long term future (ERI, 2009;Wang and Watson, 2010;Zhou et al, 2013;He, 2013;BP, 2016;Elzen etal. 2016;Liu et al, 2017)…”

“…As for the energy efficiency enhancement, the energy intensity decrease rate is set to be 4% during 2014-2030, which is higher than the average decrease rate (3.8%) during the past two decades . However, the potential for a further decline in energy-intensity may become limited over time given that China has made a great effort and progress on deployment of energy-saving technology during the past decade (Wang et al, 2014;Liu et al, 2017); and the extent to which energy efficiency can be further improved largely depends on an economic restructuring away from the energy-intensive industry in future (World Bank, 2015), which is full of uncertainty currently. Moving to the carbon intensity of energy consumption, the annual decline rate is set as 1% during 2014-2020, and further increases to 1.5% during 2020-2030 in Green and Stern's study, while actually it was only 0.5% during the past decade (2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011)(2012)(2013)(2014)(2015).…”

“…20 development (Liu et al, 2017), and the road ahead is full of challenges. For example, the restriction of the connection to the grid still heavily blocks the sustainable capacity expansion of the renewable energy, and China will restrict rapid capacity expansion in the regions where the curtailment of wind and solar power are serious, e.g.…”

Trends in CO2 Emissions from China-Oriented International Marine Transportation Activities and Policy Implications

“…However, uncertainty regarding the future can't be ignored when we evaluate development trends, which lead to various alternative scenarios. The alternative scenarios are based on technologies, policies, and measures that encourage shifts in the patterns of both energy consumption and carbon emissions compared to past trends [29]. According to the IMO report [26], transport demand, transport efficiency and marine fuel were identified as the key factors that affect future emissions.…”

Hydropower Generation Vulnerability in the Yangtze River in China under Climate Change Scenarios: Analysis Based on the WEAP Model

“…The electricity generation of hydropower increased from 3.535 trillion kWh to 1.1807 trillion kWh, and the proportion relative to the national total generating capacity increased from 16.0% to 19.7% [1]. The installed capacity of hydropower should reach 400 GW in 2030 to achieve the target of CO 2 intensity of GDP for China in 2030 [2].…”