The influences of international trade development on China's carbon emissions during the new normal economic period

This paper chose a flexible single-region model and used the conversion method from value to material of primary energy. Japan had been selected as the import representative country, and combined with the revision method of major import countries' emissions per unit of GDP. In view of the processing trade accounts for about 50% of China's total foreign trade, the existing embodied emission calculation method had been improved. The results show that the embodied emission of China's exports has been significantly improved, with decoupling between carbon emissions and exports. And the proportion of imports to China's total carbon emissions is about 3%~5%. During the 12th Five-Year Plan period (2011~2015), the net export embodied emissions and the proportion are both lower than those during the 11th Five-Year Plan period (2006~2010). This indicates that the achievements of China's export policy adjustment are emerging. However, there needs to be constant adherence to the optimization of import and export polices. Then the balance between the import and export embodied emissions can be achieved as soon as possible. The rapid decline in investment growth has also begun to impact the industrial structure. But in the future, China needs to further accelerate the growth of final consumption to make up for the lack of demand caused by the decline in investment and encourage the development of demand of services industry. © 2020, Editorial Board of China Environmental Science. All right reserved.