Drivers for decoupling carbon footprint pressure from economic growth in China’s provinces

Abstract

A growing imbalance between energy carbon emissions and vegetation carbon sequestration is a major impediment to achieving Sustainable Development Goals. Decoupling the growing imbalance from economic growth needs a stringent and coordinated package of sustainable policies. Previously, enhancing efficiency and vegetation carbon sequestration were dominant drivers to decouple. However, the role and magnitude of restructurings in the energy sector and economy in decoupling were underestimated. In this context, China’s 30 provinces were selected as study areas. By employing a carbon footprint pressure (CFP) indicator to represent the imbalance, a widely decoupling method was adopted to describe the decoupling state and trend of CFP and economic growth. An extended IPAT equation and the Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index method were further used to reveal the role and magnitude of drivers on decoupling. The findings revealed that the CFP climbed significantly in 26 provinces between 2006 and 2015. We discovered that 22 provinces were working toward absolute decoupling, with 15 provinces achieving it during the 12-th Five-Year Plan. Our analysis revealed that improving energy efficiency was the primary driver of absolute decoupling, while substituting natural gas and oil for coal, reducing industry share, and enhancing carbon sequestration accelerated absolute decoupling. Considering the limited future role of improving energy efficiency and vegetation carbon sequestration, there is an urgent need to optimize and upgrade the structures of the energy sector and economy to mitigate the future climate risk.