Energy-saving implications from supply chain improvement: An exploratory study on China's consumer goods retail system

Xi Wang, Hua Cai and H. Keith Florig

Energy Policy, 2016, vol. 95, issue C, 411-420

Abstract: Despite significant public attentions to green supply chain management, few studies have explicitly addressed the energy implications of consumer-goods supply surplus, especially in developing countries like China. This study explored the energy-saving potential from improving supply chain efficiencies and reducing excess inventory in China's retail system from a life-cycle perspective. Through embodied energy analysis, we found that energy invested pre-manufacture contributed 80–95% of the total energy embodied in consumer products. Although embodied energy intensities had declined by 60–90% since the mid-1990s, the lessened marginal improvements implied that "low hanging fruits" have largely been captured, and the search for new opportunities for energy-saving is in demand. Positive correlations between total economic inputs and embodied energy in consumer goods indicated possible synergy effect between cost-reduction and energy-saving in supply system management. And structural path analysis identified sector-specific energy management priorities for each retail-related sector. This study suggested that improving supply chain efficiencies provides a promising supplement to China's current industrial energy-efficient projects which target reducing direct energy use per se as an intra-firm cost-saving measure. From the life-cycle perspective, the definition of "green sector" might have to be reconsidered in China towards a more energy-efficient economy and society.

Keywords: Embodied energy; Life cycle assessment; Energy efficiency; Green supply chain; Excess inventory; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (14)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:enepol:v:95:y:2016:i:c:p:411-420

DOI: 10.1016/j.enpol.2016.04.044

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