Effects of carbon emission transfer on economic spillover and carbon emission reduction in China

摘要

Accurately understanding the spatial features of regional carbon emission transfer and clearly identifying economic spillover effects and emission reduction effects are important in guiding reasonable regional carbon emission transfer and promoting sustainable regional economic development. This study firstly calculated China's total provincial carbon emission import and export. Then, the Moran's I index and a geographical weighted regression model were used to illustrate the spatial features of provincial carbon emission transfer and its economic spillover effects. Finally, the reduction effects of provincial carbon emission were analyzed and optimization strategies of carbon emission transfer structure for China's provinces were proposed. The results show that: 1) The transfer amount of carbon emission in most provinces is relatively large, and on the whole, the carbon emission import is higher than the export. 2) Spatial cluster is a characteristic of the provincial carbon emission transfer in China, and the Moran's I index of carbon emission import and export is 0.17 and 0.14, respectively. 3) The carbon emission transfer in the developed central and eastern regions of China displays a High High pattern; but a Low Low pattern is displayed in the underdeveloped central and western regions; for the central regions, the transfer displayed mainly a Low-High or High-Low pattern. 4) The economic spillover effects of the carbon emission transfer can be classified into five different types. Generally, the economic spillover effects of the carbon emission import are greater than that of the export. 5) Carbon emission transfer can reduce the coal consumption in 18 provinces and help those provinces continue to maintain cleaner production modes. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.