『Abstract
We adopted the refined Laspeyres index approach to explore the
impacts of industry scale, energy mix, energy intensity and utility
mix on the total carbon dioxide emissions from the Chinese nonferrous
metals industry for the period 1996-2008. In addition, we calculated
the trend of decoupling effects in nonferrous metals industry
in China by presenting a theoretical framework for decoupling.
As the results suggest, Chinese nonferrous metals industry has
gone through four decoupling stages: strong negative decoupling
stage (1996-1998), weak decoupling stage (1999-2000), expensive
negative decoupling stage (2001-2003) and weak decoupling stage
(2004-2008). We have analyzed the reasons for each phase. Generally
speaking, the rapid growth of the industry is the most important
factor responsible for the increase of CO2
emissions, and the change in energy mix was mainly due to the
increased proportion of electric energy consumption that has contributed
to the increase of CO2 emissions. Reduction
of energy intensity has contributed significantly to emissions
decrease, and the utility mix effect has also contributed to the
emission decrease to some extent.
Keywords: Nonferrous metals industry; Decoupling; Negative decoupling』
1. Introduction
2. Methodology
2.1. The framework for decoupling judgments on CO2
emission from industry development
2.2. Decomposition model of CO2 emissions
3. Data
4. Results and discussion
4.1. CO2 emissions from the Chinese
nonferrous metals industry
4.2. Decoupling of the Chinese nonferrous metals industry from
1996 to 2008
4.3. The reason for decoupling
4.4. The reason for strong negative decoupling (1996-1998)
4.5. The reason for weak decoupling (1999-2000)
4.6. The reason for expansive negative decoupling (2001-2003)
4.7. The reason for weak decoupling (2004-2008)
5. Conclusions
Acknowledgment
References