Relationship of carbon emissions and economic growth in China's construction industry

Coordinating the dilemma of economic development and reducing carbon emissions is of great significance to reaching China's energy-saving and emission-reduction targets. This paper investigates the decoupling relationship between economic growth and carbon emissions from the construction industry of China's 30 provinces, and uses the standard deviational ellipse method to explore the spatial evolution of carbon emissions and the economy. The results indicate that the economic development levels of most provinces were positively correlated with carbon emissions. The spatial differences in the decoupling state of provincial construction industry are significant, and the decoupling states of the same type exhibited a certain spatial aggregation phenomenon. Furthermore, the spatial distribution of the output value and carbon emissions exhibited a northeast-southwest pattern. The weighted mean centers of both were located in the east and moved towards the northwestern region. These results may provide a basis for assessing regional construction carbon emissions and formulating strategies for the coordinated development of low carbon emissions in the construction industry. (C) 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.