Total CO2 emissions associated with buildings in 266 Chinese cities: characteristics and influencing factors

Rapid urbanization and increasing demand for buildings have brought tremendous pressure to reduce carbon emissions for cities. Quantifying the building emissions and exploring the socioeconomic characteristics of CO2 emissions can promote urban low-carbon development. However, existing studies have not yet provided a complete and comprehensive database of city-level CO2 emissions associated with buildings in China. Here, we calculated the building-related CO2 emissions for 266 Chinese cities in 2010 and 2015. Results show that total carbon emissions of buildings increased by 26%. We further divided cities into four groups: megalopolis, metropolises, large cities and medium and small cities. The high-emission concentrated in large cities, whereas medium and small cities showed higher emission intensity and lower per capita emissions. We show that CO2 emissions of buildings were significantly correlated with tertiary industrial outputs. The results provide scientific support for policy evaluation in a multilevel governance context for reducing CO2 emissions of buildings.