Impacts of Dynamic Province-Level Power-Grid CO₂ Emission Factor on Regional Carbon-Peaking Pathways

Abstract

The power grid CO2 emission factor is a critical parameter for accurately calculating indirect emissions from the electricity consumption side, serving as a core indicator for precisely quantifying the CO2 emission pathways at the consumption side. This study explores the temporal and spatial characteristics of the province-level power-grid CO2 emission factors from 2020 to 2035 and compares them with official-source factors. Moreover, it integrates historical direct-emission data to accurately quantify the importance of indirect emissions from the electricity consumption side. Additionally, it predicts the province-level indirect emissions and emission pathways under different scenarios from 2020 to 2035, quantifying the impacts of power grid CO2 emission factors with distinct temporal and spatial accuracies on provincial emission pathways. The results indicate that: (1) from 2020 to 2035, the power grid CO2 emission factors of all provinces are expected to exhibit sustained decreasing trends, and there are disparities between the existing publicly available power-grid CO2 emission factors and provincial levels in the study. (2) From 2010 to 2020, the indirect emissions from electricity consumption and their proportions in net electricity-importing provinces had gradually increased, with Beijing, Shanghai, and Zhejiang province having the largest proportions. (3) Under Scenarios 1 (constant power-grid CO2 emission factors on the national level) and 3 (constant power-grid CO2 emission factors on the provincial level), the indirect emissions from electricity consumption and total emissions of all provinces will be significantly higher than the estimated results in Scenarios 2 (dynamic power-grid CO2 emission factor on the national level) and 4 (dynamic power-grid CO2 emission factor on the provincial level). The estimation results of Scenarios 1 and 2 are projected to differ significantly from those of Scenarios 3 and 4. For provinces with large proportions of indirect emissions from electricity consumption, such as Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangdong, selecting power grid CO2 emission factors with different spatial accuracies is expected to have noticeable impacts on their total emissions, further leading to shifts in their peaking years. The research results can provide a reference for supporting the planning of carbon peaking pathways in various provinces and reducing the uncertainty in indirect emission forecasts.

Keywords

• power grid CO₂ emission factor
• carbon peaking
• emission pathway
• indirect emissions from electricity consumption
• province-level