Improving the regional deployment of carbon mitigation efforts by incorporating air-quality co-benefits: A multi-provincial analysis of China

It is critically important to include the co-benefits of abated air pollution when sharing carbon mitigation efforts among provinces. Therefore, using a Chinese multi-regional computable general equilibrium model, this study incorporated the pollutant co-benefits into the carbon marginal abatement cost curves and evaluated the inter-provincial abatement effort sharing for China's provinces to achieve the Nationally Determined Contribution target. Results show that the more developed eastern economies face higher abatement costs under the same abatement level compared to the less developed central and western provinces. Second, in the composition of total co-benefits among provinces, the co-benefits of SO2 reductions exceed 60% followed by the co-benefits of NOX and PM2.5 reductions. Finally, the provincial abatement costs will be offset by 4.3% to 18.9% after considering the co-benefits. Specifically, provinces with high per capita GDP and energy-intensive industries (e.g. Shandong, Liaoning, and Jilin) and some provinces with energy production bases (e.g. Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, and Xinjiang) have higher co-benefits and offset the more abatement costs; therefore, they can consider raising abatement efforts. Moreover, provinces with high economic levels but fewer co-benefits (e.g. Beijing, Tianjin, and Shanghai) can consider providing climate funding or transferring abatement technologies to support the abatement work of less developed provinces.

Automated summary

It is crucial to consider the co-benefits of reducing air pollution when distributing carbon mitigation efforts among provinces. This study incorporated pollutant co-benefits into the carbon marginal abatement cost curves using a Chinese multi-regional computable general equilibrium model. The results showed that more developed eastern provinces face higher abatement costs compared to less developed central and western provinces, and SO2 reduction provides the highest co-benefits among the provinces.