Low Carbon Development Model Research On Transportation Sector In China

With the rapid economic development, China’s energy consumption, especially oil consumption, has entered a period of rapid growth. The oil consumption growth caused by the change of transportation sector’s energy demand has exacerbated CO2emissions in China. So it is important for low carbon development mode research on transportation sector in China to seek and qualitative analysis the main factors which influences the transportation sector’s emission.Firstly, according to the existing statistical data and actual condition in China, the energy consumption and relative CO2emissions from Chinese transportation sector which include freight and inter-regional passenger traffic are calculated. Energy consumption from transportation sector increases from857.OPJ in1985to11394.5PJ in2010, by12.3times, with the increase rate of12.1%every year. The related CO2emissions increase from66.8Mt in1985to847.6Mt in2010, by11.7times, with the increase rate of11.8%every year. Freight plays a main role in these energy consumption and related CO2emissions. The proportion of freight energy consumption is91.5%, and the proportion of freight CO2emissions is91.6%in2010.Secondly, a complete decomposition model is used to qualitatively analyze CO2emissions from freight and the inter-regional passenger traffic from1985to2010in China. The factors, influencing the CO2emissions change of transportation sector, are decomposed into activity factor(turnover of traffic), the first level of structural factor(the structure of traffic modes), second level of structural factor(the structure of fuel types) and intensity factor(per unit CO2emissions). The results showed that the activity factor is the most important factor leading to the growth of CO2emissions from Chinese transportation, the first level of structural factor is also a responsible factor for the CO2emissions increase. Second level of structural factor and intensity factor have some effect on reducing CO2emissions, but the results are not evident.At last, based on the qualitative research results above, this paper analyses the low carbon development model of transportation sector in China. The low-carbon development model can be started from the following four ways. The first way is to regulate communications demand, which means reducing unnecessary traffic turnover. The second way is to improve efficiency, which means reducing vehicle’s unit CO2emissions. The third way is to optimize first level structure, which means increase the proportion of lower unit CO2 emissions’ traffic mode. The fourth way is to optimize second level structure, which means use fuel with lower emissions factor.