| Improve water efficiency is an effective means to reduce the total amount of water resources, and to make of sustainable use of water resources. Therefore, in-depth study of the efficiency of water use is critical. In this paper, based on the domestic and foreign literature about the study of the efficiency of water use, it has found that scholars study the efficiency of water use from five aspects:the difference of the inter-regional/industrial water use efficiency, the methods to improve water efficiency, water efficiency evaluation method, the efficiency of water use evaluation index and the efficiency of water use trends. This paper focuses on that with the economic growth, the relationship between efficiency of water use and total water. And to explain that reduction of the total amount of water is due to the improvement of the efficiency of water use, it is a guiding role for implementing the total water resources control method in practice.Based on above literature review, a further study on the trend between efficiency of water use and economic development, especially the related research about Environmental Kuznets Curve and decoupling theory. It has found that these two theories able to demonstrate the trend between environmental pressures and economic development, but failed to explain the internal reasons of this trend. Therefore this paper presents "natural resources utilization efficiency countering total quantity" theory to explain the intrinsic link between the efficiency of water use and total water use which are performed by the Environmental Kuznets Curve and decoupling theory. And it used to explain the curve trend between the environment pressures and economic development. The "Efficiency offsets Total" means that the amount of water consumption due to the increase in production (S2) is offset by savings due to increased efficiency of water (S1), and the total water use does not increase with the economic development. Due to the determinant conditions S1=S2, it shows that means decline in total water use, whereas the increase in the total amount of water.In order to verify the applicability of the theory of the "natural resources utilization efficiency countering total quantity ", this paper chose the steel industry to verify:At small scales, found and collected the top500corporate social responsibility report, then found out and collated the efficiency of water use and economic indicators. And chose high pollution, high water consumption of11iron and steel enterprises and select the data acquired easier and more advanced Baosteel as represented, respectively, to analyze the relationship between the efficiency of water use and economic growth as well as theoretical verification:①the total water use of11iron and steel enterprises and Baosteel shares with the growing trend towards economic growth;②the water consumption of one ton steel and water consumption of ten thousand Yuan output value of11iron and steel enterprises and Baosteel with economic growth showing an overall downward trend;③according to the judgment formula, it has analyzed that the " natural resources utilization efficiency countering total quantity " theory is successful authentication at small scales.On a large scale, collected water and economic indicators of China’s steel industry data from the yearbook of iron and steel industry of china (1986-2006), to analyze the relationship between the efficiency of water use and economic growth and give the theoretical verification to experiment results:①the total water use of China’s steel industry with the downward trend towards economic growth;②the water consumption of one ton steel and water consumption of ten thousand Yuan output value of China’s steel industry with economic growth showing an overall downward trend;③according to the judgment formula, it has analyzed that the "Efficiency offsets Total" theory is successful authentication on a large scale.The "natural resources utilization efficiency countering total quantity" theory is the derivative and progress on the basis of the Environmental Kuznets Curve and "decoupling" theory. Although the theory needs further improvement and validation, but for the future study of the relationship between water environment pressure and economic development provides a new theoretical approach.This article research was supported by the Ministry of Education, philosophy and social sciences key projects of "Water-saving society Construction"(Project Grant No.:11JZD024). Part of the research results has published in the Water&Wastewater and the Engineering:A Journal of Environmental Economics and Policy (third edition), and another part of the research results Preliminary Study of the Water Use Efficiency Model in Top500Enterprises of China was discussed in the National Academic Seminar on Environmental Project and Policy Simulation Model in2012, and has published on conference proceeding. |
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