The Impact Of Population Factors On Low-Carbon Economy In The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Economic Circle

In recent years,energy saving and emissions reduction have become the focus topics of global concern.The fossil energy consumption is the main source of carbon emissions,and as the world's biggest energy consumer and producer of carbon emissions,C hina is facing more and more severe pressure to energy saving and emissions reduction during the process of rapid industrialization and urbanization.As one of the most economically active area in C hina,Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei(BTH)economic circle is now experiencing an important social economy transformation and development,and its population development and consumption pattern of residents are undergoing profound changes.The direct and indirect energy consumption of residential consumption has overtaken industry sectors as a major growth point of carbon emission.Firstly,the paper reviews relevant literature,discusses the necessity of low-carbon development and the development of present situation of carbon emissions and population.In order to study the impact of population dynamic on energy consumption,find the key influencing factors of carbon emissions,and explore the effective pathways of developing low-carbon economy,this paper examines the impacts of population size,population structure,economic level and technology level on carbon emissions,from 1997 to 2012,in the BTH economic circle using STIRPAT model.This paper employed partial least square regression to fit the model.Results indicate that carbon emissions is positively influenced by economic level,population size,urbanization level,population age structure,population structure of employment and GDP per capita,but negatively influenced by average family size and energy intensity.Moreover,economic level is the main driving factor of carbon emissions.Average family size is the main factor to control carbon emissions.In terms of population structure,the rapid urbanization contributes to energy consumption,and the effect of age structure acted through increasing supply of the labor and consuming demands.Shrinking average family size increases per capita consumption expenditure and total number of households,thus lead to more energy consumption.Employment structure increases the industry sector employment,resulting in larger carbon emissions.Combining these empirical findings and specific circumstances,some policy recommendations are made.