Measurement And Structural Decomposition Analysis Of Carbon Emissions In The Chinese Construction Industry

Global warming caused by carbon emissions has captured much international attention and how to effectively reduce carbon emissions has become one of the focus concerned by governments, economic entities and researchers. With the rapid urbanization and the high speed development of economy, China has become the largest carbon emissions in the world. The construction industry, as the pillar industry of Chinese economy, developed very rapidly in the past dozen years, which induced a huge increase on the consumption of resources, leading to rapid growth of carbon emissions in the construction industry. So far, the construction industry has become one of the largest carbon emissions emitter among all industries in China. Measuring the carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry and analyzing their influence factors systematically can not only help China’s government formulate feasible policies and measures to reduce carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry, but also help China reduce carbon emissions at the national level and realize the promise of carbon emission reduction.First of all, the study constructs the input-output model and the structural decomposition model and establishes input-output sequence tables on comparable price from 1995 to 2009. Then the study measures the carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry over 1995-2009 with the application of the input-output model and the above tables. Finally the study analyzes the effects of factors, including the carbon intensity, the technical coefficient, the proportion of construction final demand, the final demand per capita and population, on the changes of carbon emissions in the Chines construction industry for the period from 1995 to 2009 by using the structural decomposition model and the above tables. Through the above analysis, the main conclusions are as follows:(1) During 1995-2009, the carbon emissions in the construction industry increased by 241.7% while the carbon emission intensity of construction industry decreased by 43.2%.(2) During 1995-2009, the indirect carbon emissions had always been the dominant part of the carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry, of which the proportion had maintained above 95%.(3) During 1995-2009, the electricity, gas and water supply industry and the other non-metallic mineral industry, the basic metal and fabricated metal industry had always contributed the largest proportion to the carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry; the proportion of the carbon emissions contributed by the electricity, gas and water supply industry had generally increased.(4) From 1995 to 2009, the carbon intensity was the largest contributor to the decrease of carbon emission in the Chinese construction industry; the final demand per capita contributed the most to the total increase of carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry, following by the technical coefficient and the ratio of final demand for the construction industry to total final demand; the effect of the population on the changes in carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry was not significant.(5) During 1995-2009, the carbon intensity had always been the contributor to reducing the carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry; the technical coefficient had generally contributed to reducing the carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry during 1995-2002, while the technical coefficient had had opposite impact on them during 2002-2009; the ratio of final demand for the construction industry to total final demand caused an increase on carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry over most of the periods; the final demand per capita and the population had always contributed to the increase on carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry.(6) During 1995-2009, the electricity, gas and water supply industry and the other non-metallic mineral industry, the basic metal and fabricated metal industry had been the main contributors to the effects of the factors on the changes of carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry all the time.