China's Foreign Trade And Implicit Domestic Energy Consumption

Economic development is facing resource and energy constraints, as well as bringing environmental pollution which is going worse and worse. In this context, researches on energy consumption and green house gases emissions become hot topics among economists. Based on Leontief Input-output analysis, this paper is to calculate the total energy consumption intensity, as well as primary consumption intensities of coal, crude oil, natural gas and electricity embodied in China’s domestic production activities from2002-2007. With these consumption intensities, we then further explore the domestic energy embodied in China’s export as well as the share of energy consumption by export and other final demands, including household consumption, government expenditure and investment.Calculations on total energy consumptions show that:(1) From2002to2007, embodied total energy intensities of all industries dropped substantially, but the average total energy intensity embodied in the top10exporting industries are still higher than the average level of all industries, which indicates that China’s export-oriented industries are more energy intensive.(2) Embodied total energy in China’s export increased a lot from2002-2007, with the increase of top10exporting industries more than that of all industries. And also, the energy consumption share of the top10exporting industries among all industries increased as well. This indicates that the top10industries are becoming the primary driving force for export’s energy consumption.(3) The total energy consumption share of export and household consumption among all final demands changed oppositely, with that of export rising from18%to27.4%and that of household consumption dropping from30.2%to22.4%.(4) When driving the same amount of economic growth, export and investment require more total energy consumption than household consumption and government expenditure.Calculations on the consumption of coal, oil, natural gas and primary electricity show that:(1) Primary embodied coal, oil, natural gas and electricity intensities of all industries dropped from2002to2007, among which, that of oil dropped the most and that of natural gas dropped the least.(2) Average primary intensities of coal, oil and natural gas embodied in the top10exporting industries are lower than those embodied in all industries, while average primary intensity of electricity embodied in the top10 exporting industries is higher than that embodied in all industries, suggesting that coal, oil and natural transformed into electricity and other kinds of energy to increase the average total energy intensity embodied in the top10exporting industries.(3) The primary coal, oil, natural gas and electricity consumption shares of export and household consumption among all final demands changed oppositely as well, with those of export rising respectively from17.2%,15.3%,18.1%and18.8%to25.8%,25.8%,26%and28.7%and those of household consumption dropping respectively from33.8%,29.7%,31.2%and31.9%to25.7%,24.3%,26.8%and23.6%. Based on the above analysis, we conclude some policy implications.