1 research outputs found
How Well Have China’s Recent Five-Year Plans Been Implemented for Energy Conservation and Air Pollution Control?
This
study evaluates how well China’s 11th and 12th Five-Year Plans
have been implemented in terms of energy conservation and air pollution
control and deconstructs the effects of the economic, energy, and
environmental policies included in the Plans. A “counterfactual”
comparative-scenario method is deployed, which assumes a business
as usual scenario in which the changes in economic, energy, and environmental
parameters are “frozen”, and then reactivates them one
by one, with the help of LEAP modeling. It is found that during the
11th Five-Year Plan period, the binding targets were basically achieved.
Economic growth put a great strain upon the energy demand and the
environment, but energy policy made a decisive contribution by promoting
energy efficiency and structure. Environmental policy promoted the
deployment of end-of-pipe treatment which led to the control of certain
air pollutants but at the expense of an increase in energy use and
in the emission of other pollutants. During the ongoing 12th Five-Year Plan period, energy policy’s potential for efficiency
improvement is shrinking, but economic policy is restraining economic
growth thus making a positive contribution. Environmental policy attempts
to enforce multipollutant reduction, but there is still insufficient
focus on the cocontrol of different pollutants and CO<sub>2</sub>