Energy-environmental Efficiency,and Conservation Policies In China’s Light Industry Sector

In the face of climate change and increasingly stringent constraints of environment and resources,China’s industris are all seeking for a green transformation.China’s light industry sector provides consumer-goods for more than a billion people.In 2015,the sector’s energy consumption was 370 million tons of coal equivalents(tce),accounting for about 8.5%of China’s total energy use,which almost equaled to the amount of South Korea.As income increases,people will pursue a more comfortable life style.Thus,consumer-goods will become more diversified and more delicate.As a result,energy consumption in light industry sector tends to increase.With many small and medium-sized enterprises(SMEs),light industry is faced with high financing costs.In the face of the worker-force’s reduction,how to substitue labor for capital and energy effectively is the key to further development.Beginning with investigations of energy intensity and carbon emissions,this paper mainly talks about green transformation in China’s light industry sector from four aspects.First,energy-environmental efficiency in different regions are examined;then,the impacts of financing constraints on corporate environmental performance are investigated.Third,the emboded energy and carbon emissions for industrial exports in China’s light industry is calculated,as well as the green total factor productivity(GTFP),which is aquired using life cycle assessment(LCA).Fourth,translog cost function is employed to see the substitution possibility between input factors and various fuel sources.In addition,enery rebound effect in light industry sector is also calculated in this part.The main conclusions of this paper are as follows,(1)The energy intensity of light industry has a negative correlation with labor productivity and energy price in the medium and long run,and has a positive correlation with the proportion of fossil fuels and GDP per capita.(2)The main factors of carbon emission in light industry are energy intensity effect,energy structure effect and total output effect.The intermediate use effect in the total output effect is the prevailing factor that leads to the increase of emissions,and the energy intensity effect is the main reduction factor.From 2002 to 2007,the pulling effect of exports increased obviously,which contributed most to carbon emission in this period.(3)The average energy-environmental efficiency in the east is the highest.The central region lied behind the west before 2008,and exceeded the west after 2009.Efficiency differences in the central were least,while they were the highest in the west.(4)No obvious negative correlation between micro financing constraints and corporate environmental performance is observed.Moderate and large financing constraints have a negative correlation with corporate environmental performance,and the greater the financing constraints,the greater the negative correlation is observed.In addition,a larger scale and a high state-owned capital correspond to a better environmental performance.(5)From 1997 to 2002,from 2002 to 2007,and from 2007 to 2012,GTFP of light industry exports were 10.4%,4.7%,13.8%,respectively under life cycle assessment(LCA).From 1997 to 2002,both technical change and efficiency change were positive.While in the other two periods,GTFP mainly relied on technical change,and efficiency change had a negative impact on the GTFP.(6)Energy,capital and labor are substitutes for each other,as well as various fuel sources(coal,electricity and oil etc.).Therefore,increasing capital investment and improving labor quality to save energy is feasible.In the decomposition of energy intensity,it is found that budget effect and substitution effect contributed most to the reduction of energy consumption per unit of output value,while the contribution of output effect and technology progress was relatively small.(7)The rebound effect caused by price decline of useful energy service is about 37.7%in light industry sector,which is less than 100%.Energy consumption in light industry sector can be effectively reduced by promoting energy efficiency.When energy efficiency increases,effective energy services become cheap.It may lead to increasing of energy use.The rebound effect from this channel offsets a large part of energy,which should be conserved otherwise.This paper may contribute to the current literature in the following thress aspects.A preliminary investigation how financing constraints impair firm’s environmental performance is conducted.A hybrid input-output table is used to calculate GTFP ofChina’s light industry under life cycle assessment(LCA).At the decomposition of energy prices,it is found that the decline of light industry energy prices mostly occurred in the period of economic crisis.In this way,the usual method of calculating rebound effect with price elasticity is not in line with economic realities.A corrected calculation is presented in this paper.