Decomposition Analysis of Energy-Related CO 2 Emissions and Decoupling Status in China’s Logistics Industry

Shiqing Zhang, Jianwei Wang and Wenlong Zheng
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Shiqing Zhang: School of Economics and Management, Chang’an University, Middle Section of South Second Ring Road, Xi’an 710064, China
Jianwei Wang: Research Center for Low-carbon Transportation, School of Economics and Management, Chang’an University, Middle Section of South Second Ring Road, Xi’an 710064, China
Wenlong Zheng: School of Economics and Management, Chang’an University, Middle Section of South Second Ring Road, Xi’an 710064, China

Sustainability, 2018, vol. 10, issue 5, 1-21

Abstract: The logistics industry is one of the major fossil energy consumers and CO 2 emitters in China, which plays an important role in achieving sustainable development as well as China’s emission reduction targets. To identify the key influencing factors regarding the logistics of CO 2 reductions and ensure that the development of China’s logistics industry becomes less dependent on CO 2 emissions, this paper built an extended log-mean Divisia index model (LMDI) to decompose the logistics of CO 2 changes between 1985 and 2015. Then, we introduced a decoupling model that combined the decomposition results to analyze the decoupling state and identify the main factors that influenced the decoupling relationship. The results show the following. (1) The urbanization effect was the decisive factor in CO 2 emissions increases, followed by structural adjustment effects, while technological progress effects played a major role in inhibiting CO 2 emissions. Particularly, the energy structure showed great potential for CO 2 emissions reduction in China. (2) Highways appeared to have dominant promoting roles in increasing CO 2 emissions regarding transportation structure effects; highways and aviation proved to have the largest impact on CO 2 emission reduction. (3) There has been an increase in the number of expansive negative decoupling states between 2005 and 2015, which implies that the development of the logistics industry has become more dependent on CO 2 emissions. Finally, this paper puts forward some policy implications for CO 2 emission reductions in China’s logistics industry.

Keywords: energy-related CO 2 emissions; extended LMDI model; decoupling analysis; logistics industry (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (18)

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