Decoupling economic growth from building embodied carbon emissions in China: A nighttime light data-based innovation approach

The contribution of the construction sector is indispensable for the realization of China's carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals. However, existing studies have focused on the decoupling relationship between GDP and building life cycle carbon emissions, neglecting the utilization of Night Time Light data (NTL). The research question of this research is how to describe the decoupling relationship between Economic Growth (EG) and Building Embodied Carbon emissions (BECs) by introducing NTL. To tackle this question, the carbon emission coefficient approach is used to calculate BECs first. Then, both GDP and NTL are selected to reflect EG. The Tapio model is utilized to examine the regional and temporal evolution of China's inter-provincial decoupling performance. The main findings are as follows: 1) the number of provinces that achieved decoupling status in China is increasing, and progress has been made in BECs reduction. 2) There are significant regional differences in the decoupling of China's BECs. Particularly, most of the provinces in the south of the Hu Huanyong line show a negative decoupling for the year 2020 due to the impact of COVID-19. 3) The long-term decoupling results of GDP and NTL are consistent, while the short-term decoupling results obtained via NTL are more accurate. The study can enrich the application of NTL in the field of BECs, and provide a basis for the Government to set effective carbon reduction targets and pathways.