Low-carbon development in the least developed region: a case study of Guangyuan, Sichuan province, southwest China

Dabo Guan () and Terry Barker

Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, 2012, vol. 62, issue 2, 243-254

Abstract: The Wenchuan earthquake in 2008 has resulted in 50% of Guangyuan city facing recovery from different extents of damages. The massive reconstruction provides a good opportunity for Guangyuan city to response to the National Council’s call for tackling climate change by developing a harmonised and low-carbon economy. However, there are many arguments about the definition of ‘low carbon’ and the framework that low-carbon development should follow. Low-carbon development in an economically least developed region such as Guangyuan would provide evidence and contribute to the discussion. The paper employs CO 2 emissions as an environmental indicator in scenario analysis to investigate Guangyuan’s future carbon performance in following the national call of reducing 40% of carbon intensity by 2020 and an alternative low-carbon development path. The results have demonstrated that a ‘win–win’ solution can be reached—keeping rapid economic growth while reducing CO 2 emissions, however, only by addressing the ‘correct’ determining factors. Technology improvements and production structure changes have been identified as the key determining factors to affect both carbon intensity and CO 2 emissions in the future. The two factors are also interdependent. Governmental policies should give appropriate guideline to address both factors but with strong emphasis on production structure decarbonisation in order to avoid the mistake of ‘polluting first and deal with the pollution later’ during the emission-intensive industrialisation processes that many western countries and China’s coastal regions have followed. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2012

Keywords: Low-carbon development; Carbon intensity; CO 2 emission; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11069-011-9993-3 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:nathaz:v:62:y:2012:i:2:p:243-254

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11069

DOI: 10.1007/s11069-011-9993-3

Access Statistics for this article

Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards is currently edited by Thomas Glade, Tad S. Murty and Vladimír Schenk

More articles in Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards from Springer, International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().