Examination of the relationship between urban form and urban eco-efficiency in china

The present study aims at exploring whether aspects of urban form are associated with urban eco-efficiency in China. Quantitative indicators relating to urban form (form, compactness ratio, elongation ratio and population density) and urban eco-efficiency (resource efficiency, environmental efficiency and overall eco-efficiency) were selected and quantified using remote sensing and data envelopment analysis methods. The urban form aspects of form and compactness ratios were positively correlated with urban eco-efficiency and resource efficiency. Conversely, the urban elongation ratio exhibited negative correlations with urban eco-efficiency and resource efficiency. Regarding environmental efficiency, no significant correlation is found with compactness though a negative correlation is found with population density. These results indicate that, within China, designing cities to be compact may be lead to increases in eco-efficiency and resource efficiency, but if the population density is too high the increased pollution costs will result in a decrease in environmental efficiency. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.