Influencing Factors and Decoupling Elasticity of China's Transportation Carbon Emissions

Transportation is an important source of carbon emissions in China. Reduction in carbon emissions in the transportation sector plays a key role in the success of China's energy conservation and emissions reduction. This paper, for the first time, analyzes the drivers of carbon emissions in China's transportation sector from 2000 to 2015 using the Generalized Divisia Index Method (GDIM). Based on this analysis, we use the improved Tapio model to estimate the decoupling elasticity between the development of China's transportation industry and carbon emissions. The results show that: (1) the added value of transportation, energy consumption and per capita carbon emissions in transportation have always been major contributors to China's carbon emissions from transportation. Energy carbon emission intensity is a key factor in reducing carbon emissions in transportation. The carbon intensity of the added value and the energy intensity have a continuous effect on carbon emissions in transportation; (2) compared with the increasing factors, the decreasing factors have a limited effect on inhibiting the increase in carbon emissions in China's transportation industry; (3) compared with the total carbon emissions decoupling state, the per capita decoupling state can more accurately reflect the relationship between transportation and carbon emissions in China. The state of decoupling between the development of the transportation industry and carbon emissions in China is relatively poor, with a worsening trend after a short period of improvement; (4) the decoupling of transportation and carbon emissions has made energy-saving elasticity more important than the per capita emissions reduction elasticity effect. Based on the conclusions of this study, this paper puts forward some policy suggestions for reducing carbon emissions in the transportation industry.