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The world is facing the challenges of climate change and energy structure adjustments. The role of digital finance, a new branch of business that combines digital technology and traditional financial products, in reducing global carbon emissions needs to be studied. This paper uses panel data on 280 cities in China from 2011 to 2019 to empirically examine the efficacy of digital finance for governing carbon emission reductions and the mechanism by which it does so. The results show that (1) digital finance can facilitate carbon emission reductions and help reduce carbon emission intensity within regions; (2) digital finance helps promote the rational allocation of resources and alleviates factor distortions by encouraging firms to rationally use their own factor endowments so as to reduce carbon emission intensity, which holds robustly after considering the endogenous issues such as possibly omitting variables and collinearity; and (3) differences in geographical location, the vitality of regional innovation and entrepreneurship, regional willingness to protect the environment, and environmental protection levels lead to heterogeneity in the effect of digital finance on carbon emission intensity. Therefore, it is necessary to vigorously develop digital finance as a long-term tool for carbon governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the annual mean PM2.5 concentration data of 30 provinces and cities in China from 2006 to 2020, this paper constructs a structural model of manufacturing haze pollution, expounds the main mechanisms affecting haze pollution, then statistically decomposes the main factors affecting the change of pollution emissions, and examines the direct and indirect impact paths of the change of haze pollution emissions in China. The study found that (1) the inhibitory effects of latent variables on manufacturing haze pollution is from strong to weak in order: industrial structure upgrading, environmental regulation, trade opening, productivity improvement, and economic scale expansion, while the optimal path for the indirect effect of exogenous latent variables on haze pollution is to rely on environmental regulation and opening up to achieve the improvement of productivity, so as to achieve the purpose of reducing haze pollution. (2) The analysis based on the PVAR model found that industrial structure adjustment is the key factor of haze decline in both the short and long term. Environmental regulation has an obvious effect on haze control in the short term, but in the long run, it still needs to rely on industrial structure adjustment, production efficiency improvement, and trade opening to achieve the goal of reducing haze. (3) There is an inverted U-shaped nonlinear relationship between output scale and environmental regulation. In addition, trade openness has a long-term effect on productivity. Technology spillovers from opening up can reduce haze pollution in the long run by improving productivity. (4) The environmental regulation policy in the central region is characterized by "race to the bottom," while the eastern region shows the characteristic of "race to the top" in the policy game of improving productivity and optimizing the industrial structure. Therefore, haze control requires an appropriate intensity of environmental regulation to reduce the proportion of high pollution and high energy consumption industries. Make full use of the international cooperation platform of the "the Belt and Road Initiative" and the pilot free trade zone to promote substantive cooperation between Chinese enterprises and developed countries in the field of environmental protection technology, increase investment in research and development of clean equipment and cleaner production technology, improve productivity, help China's green manufacturing, and contribute Chinese wisdom and Chinese solutions to global environmental governance and climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the climate proxy data, several recent studies have concluded that the Ming dynasty's reign in China coincided with the Little Ice Age, a global crisis. In response, scholars have published several reports in recent years addressing this topic. This paper presents a comprehensive overview of the current research findings in English regarding this subject and identifies existing research gaps. The author proposes that the impact of climate on different regions during the late Ming period remains largely underexplored. Furthermore, scholars must exercise caution when assuming that adverse climatic conditions uniformly impacted the Ming empire during the Little Ice Age. This paper also highlights the use of simplistic models by scholars linking cold and dry climates to crop failure, floods, droughts, population decline, and other factors. However, any straightforward models that presume causal determination risk ignoring historical facts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A comprehensive and accurate estimation of water quality in lakes and reservoirs is vital for the protection of the aquatic biota. Research on the spatiotemporal variations of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) concentrations in lacustrine systems is typically plagued, however, by a lack of long‐term, spatially continuous monitoring data. This paper assembled a 30‐year (1989–2018) data set of water quality in 586 lakes and reservoirs in China, along with basin characteristics and climate conditions, forming the comprehensive data set available. These data were then used in a stacking model (based on random forest, support vector regression, and K‐nearest neighbor models) to identify the relationships between nutrient concentrations and their influencing factors, including net anthropogenic N/P inputs, geographical position, climate, land use pattern, and soil type. The stacking models were developed using data collected over multiple time scales (annual, seasonal, and monthly), which were then applied to reconstruct TN and TP concentrations during the periods of 1980–2018 and 2020s–2050s under the climate scenarios of RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5. The accuracy of the stacking models was 99.1% and 98.3% for TN and TP concentrations using ensembled data, respectively. The interannual variations in TN and TP contents in the 586 lakes and reservoirs during 1980–2018 exhibited a non‐monotonic pattern with a peak of 1.12 and 0.049 mg/L in 2007, respectively. This study demonstrates that stacking machine learning models represent a new effective approach for estimating nutrient concentrations in unmonitored lakes and reservoirs across broad spatiotemporal scales. Plain Language Summary: The current research assembled a 30‐year (1989–2018) data set of 586 lake and reservoir water quality as well as watershed characteristics and climate conditions at a national scale to build the stacking models. As far as we know, this is the most comprehensive data set of Chinese lake and reservoir water quality. Our study first developed models take into account more indicators of the terrestrial ecosystem and consider the impact of spatial attributes and natural background conditions of lakes and reservoirs on TN and TP concentrations. We then applied the stacking model combined the results of various base machine learning algorithms to reduce the variations of the prediction and assimilating the advantages of the base models. Through containing precipitation and temperature variables with various time scales, the models have the ability to estimate and predict the annual, seasonal, and monthly variations in TN and TP concentrations during the period of 1980–2018 and 2020–2050s under different future climate scenarios. The primary target of this paper is to probe the potential benefits of using a stacking model approach to more accurately describe and reconstruct TN and TP concentrations in lakes and reservoirs throughout China over a range of spatiotemporal scales. Key Points: λ $\lambda $ This study provides spatiotemporal estimates of nutrient concentrations in 586 lakes and reservoirs of Chinaλ $\lambda $ Spatiotemporal differences of nutrient concentrations and associated drivers have been revealedλ $\lambda $ Future changes in TN and TP concentrations were estimated for selected climate scenarios [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change has a profound impact on human survival and development. Climate change is an energy and economic issue, which should be driven by technology. Total factor energy efficiency (TFEE) improvement is undoubtedly a breakthrough in solving energy problems. In this paper, the fixed effect model, impulse response function, and threshold regression model are used to test the complex relationship between export sophistication and TFEE. The results reveal that export sophistication improvement leads to higher TFEE. The impulse response results verify the existence of a phased and positive correlation between export sophistication and TFEE. Finally, the relationship between export sophistication and TFEE significantly varied across different threshold levels of regional corruption score, economic development, and openness. This article led the foundation for supporting China's export sophistication promotion strategy and also provides a reference for energy efficiency improvement and energy crisis response in the post-pandemic era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to strengthen research concerning the impact of climate change on China's water resources, in order to avoid extreme weather events such as regional rainstorms and floods affecting the stable supply of energy and electricity. The goal is to reorganize energy industry allocation to make China's energy the most efficient, which would thus help achieve sustainable development goals. The biggest contribution and of this paper is not only to enlarge the scale and take into account the sustainable aspects, but also to consider climate change factors that have been ignored in the past as exogenous variables. For the first time, we take stock of the optimal allocation of new and tradition energy sources and carbon dioxide. This study uses the Dynamic ZSG-DDF model with exogenous variables and undesirable outputs to find a way to redistribute carbon dioxide, new energy, and tradition energy from different provinces on the premise of maximizing efficiency, thus achieving the goal of reducing carbon and saving the earth. The research results show that the energy efficiency of tradition energy is higher than that of new energy in various provinces. At the same time, the China government must comprehensively review the quota targets of new energy, tradition energy, and carbon dioxide (CO2) in each province as quickly as possible. Currently, the quotas of various provinces are seriously misplaced, and 26 provinces in total have great room for improvement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the primary source of carbon dioxide fixation, vegetation is critical to the carbon sink process. In this paper, the Net Primary Productivity (NPP) and the Gross Primary Productivity (GPP) were simulated using the Carnegie-Ames-Stanford Approach (CASA) model and the Vegetation Photosynthesis Model (VPM), respectively, and then the Potential Gross Primary Productivity (PGPP) and the GPP affected by human activities (AGPP) were simulated by combining Potential Net Primary Productivity (PNPP), and then the impact of climate change and human activities on GPP was assessed in the Heihe River Basin (HRB). The results showed that the GPP of grassland and Bare or Sparse Vegetation (BSV) exhibited a fluctuation rise, with increases of 0.709 gCm−2 a−1 and 0.115 gCm−2 a−1, respectively, whereas the GPP of cropland showed a fluctuation reduction, with a decline rate of −0.465 gCm−2 a−1. Climate change and human activity are both positive for vegetation growth, and human activity being the primary factor influencing GPP change. Human-dominated vegetation restoration accounted for 56.1% of the overall restoration area, with grassland GPP being the most visible response to human activities. The GPP changes in crop and grassland had a positive correlation with precipitation but a negative correlation with temperature among climate change factors, whereas the GPP changes in BSV had a negative correlation with both precipitation and temperature. Quantitative analyses of climate change and human activities' dynamic contributions to vegetation can give scientific and theoretical insight for dealing with global climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) offers great opportunities for China and Mongolia to collaborate on tackling climate change. However, few studies have focused on China--Mongolia collaboration on climate change under the BRI's sustainable development framework; in particular, studies have neglected the factors and feasibility of collaboration. Focusing on China and Mongolia, this study first discusses the evolution of legislation in China and Mongolia in the context of dealing with climate change and then explores the factors that influence China--Mongolia collaboration on climate change mitigation from the perspectives of climate environmental governance and energy development at the domestic level. Subsequently, the paper analyzes the Paris Agreement to identify international factors that can influence climate change cooperation between the two countries. Finally, based on the results of this analysis, this paper identifies geopolitical relations, the energy supply, technology and investment, and the demand for a transition to sustainable development as the main driving forces for China and Mongolia to collaborate on climate change mitigation under the BRI. Finally, the paper concludes that collaboration between the two countries is highly feasible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In response to the global climate change and the need for green and low-carbon development, hydrogen energy has been recognized as a clean energy source that can achieve carbon neutrality unlike fossil fuels. As a country with a shortage of energy resources, the development of hydrogen energy is of significant importance for China to adjust its energy structure and accelerate the new era of energy transformation. Based on the development of China's hydrogen energy industry, this paper elaborates on the current status and development trends of key technologies in the entire industrial chain of hydrogen energy in various stages including production, storage, transportation, and application, and identifies the problems and challenges of hydrogen energy development. The paper focuses on the analysis of hydrogen storage and transportation application scenarios and clarifies the selection of hydrogen storage and transportation technologies in different scenarios. To achieve healthy development of China's hydrogen energy industry, it is necessary to strengthen top-level design, make strategic planning, encourage large-scale state-owned energy enterprises to play a leading role, promote the development of the entire industry chain, increase technological research and development efforts, prevent the risk of core technology constraints, and vigorously promote the application of hydrogen energy to realize the construction of a hydrogen energy society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To detect potential impacts of climate change on the distribution of common echinoderm species in the Yellow Sea (YS) and East China Sea (ECS), species distribution models (SDMs) were applied. Ensemble SDMs were constructed and were in good model performance for six of the eight selected common echinoderm species. Under future climate scenarios, the brittle stars Ophiopholis mirabilis, Amphioplus depressus and the sea cucumber Protankyra bidentata were projected to expand in the southwestern areas of the YS, the ECS, and the coastal areas of the YS and ECS, respectively; the brittle stars Stegophiura sladeni, Amphiura digitula and Amphiura vadicola will likely contract their ranges in the south distribution areas and expand in the north, showing a northward movement trend. Temperature was the most important environmental variable influencing the distribution of the latter three echinoderms. Our findings will improve our understanding of the impacts of climate change on marine species distributions., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Combining the comprehensive effects of temperature and humidity, this study applies a heat stress index to project future population exposure to high temperature and related health-risks over China under different climate change scenarios. Results show that the number of high temperature days, population exposure and their related health-risks will increase significantly in the future compared to the reference period (1985-2014), which is mainly caused by the change of >T99p (the wet bulb globe temperature >99th percentile derived from the reference period). The population effect is absolutely dominant in influencing the decrease in exposure to T90-95p (the wet bulb globe temperature is in the range of (90th, 95th]) and T95-99p (the wet bulb globe temperature is in the range of (95th, 99th]), and the climate effect is the most prominent contributor to the upsurge in exposure to > T99p in most areas. An additional 0.1 billion person-days increase in population exposure to T90-95p, T95-99p and >T99p in a given year is associated with the number of deaths by 1002 (95% CI: 570-1434), 2926 (95% CI: 1783-4069) and 2635 (95% CI: 1345-3925), respectively. Compared with the reference period, total exposure to high temperature under the SSP2-4.5 (SSP5-8.5) scenario will increase to 1.92 (2.01) times in the near-term (2021-2050) and 2.16 (2.35) times in the long-term (2071-2100), which will increase the number of people at heat risk by 1.2266 (95% CI: 0.6341-1.8192) [1.3575 (95% CI: 0.6926-2.0223)] and 1.5885 (95% CI: 0.7869-2.3902) [1.8901 (95% CI:0.9230-2.8572)] million, respectively. Significant geographic variations exist in the changes of exposure and related health-risks. The change is greatest in the southwest and south, whereas it is relatively small in the northeast and north. The findings provide several theoretical references for climate change adaptation., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

This paper explores the relationship between normalized vegetation index (NDVI) response to precipitation and temperature conditions by analyzing the spatial and temporal variation of vegetation cover (NDVI) in Mu Us Desert during 2000-2019. MODIS vegetation indices are designed to provide consistent spatial and temporal comparisons of vegetation conditions. Maximum Value Composites (MVC) is an internationally used statistical method for NDVI data. Based on MODIS remote sensing data, the NDVI of Mu Us Desert sandy land from 2000 to 2019 was analyzed by using the linear regression slope method. In 2000-2010 and 2010-2019, there was a difference in the change rate of vegetation index in Mu Us Desert, with the average slope of 0.0650/10a for the former and 0.0782/10a for the latter. The trends of NDVI values in the study area during 2000-2019 were roughly the same as those of precipitation, and slightly different from those of temperature, but the overall correlation between NDVI values and both was good. There is a significant positive correlation between NDVI and annual precipitation (0.687), and a weak correlation with temperature (0.264). The vegetation growth in Mu Us Desert is affected by both precipitation and temperature.

Steel sheeting is usually provided at the upper flange of purlin in steel roof with screw connections. The resulting diaphragm effect provided by the sheeting enhances the buckling resistance of the purlin. However, this diaphragm effect will be reduced due to any abnormality in the screw connection caused by wind-induced fatigue particularly from typhoon. This would reduce the buckling resistance of the purlin with sheeting (the purlin-sheeting system), and it would affect subsequent condition evaluation during their service life. This problem is addressed in this paper with a framework of time-dependent reliability evaluation of the buckling limit state of the purlin-sheeting system. The buckling resistance reduction due to the degradation of the diaphragm effect from typhoon is taken into account in the resistance model. The randomness of wind intensity and landfall occurrence of typhoon during the service life of purlin are also accounted for in the wind load effect model. The time-dependent reliability of the purlin at different positions of a roof is studied. Then the variation of reliability of the system due to the effect of climatic changes in the design service life is discussed. The proposed strategy is then applied to the evaluation of a purlin-sheeting system in eleven cities in China with typhoon occurrences with some useful results for future studies in the provisions of the design code. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adaptive farming behavior is a key strategy for farmers to cope with climate change. This paper aims to explore the potential impacts of climate change information sources on farmers’ adaptive farming behavior. This paper clarifies the internal mechanism of three typical information sources, namely government departments, scientific research institutions and neighborhood communication, affecting farmers' adaptive farming behavior. Based on the sample data of 1200 farmers in the main wheat producing areas of Shaanxi Province, the theoretical conjecture is empirically tested. The results showed that the climate change information from government departments and scientific research institutions has a significant positive impact on farmers' adaptive farming behavior, but in the case of considering the three sources of information at the same time, the information source of scientific research institutions has the strongest positive impact on farmers' adaptive farming behavior. After farmers have access to climate change information exchanged by government departments, scientific research institutions and neighbors, their differences in climate change adaptive farming behavior mainly depend on their climate change cognition rather than subject trust factors. Formally organized climate change information represented by government departments and scientific research institutions has a more significant positive impact on farmers' adaptive farming behavior, but this impact depends largely on whether the information obtained by farmers can improve their climate change awareness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a novel aviation CO 2 emissions reduction method by introducing a market-based incentive mechanism. An aviation carbon emissions prediction model is proposed to characterize both the microscopic flight dynamics and the macroscopic air traffic demand trend. Based on emissions prediction, a linear climate response model is applied to evaluate the environmental impact of the aviation carbon emissions. Finally, a market-based framework for aviation CO 2 emissions reduction is established based on a two-phase carbon trading model, which provides a piecewise charge method through emission taxation and cap-and-trade. A case study is carried out to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed framework using a real-world dataset from the Hefei Air Traffic Control Zone in China. Three scenarios are defined to describe the possible development speed of sustainable aviation fuel application in the future: not applied, medium-speed development, and high-speed development. The results show that the carbon peak will be reached in 2025 in the high-speed development scenario, when the emission amount and associated environmental impact will be reduced by 23.7% and 22.3%, respectively. Thus, the market-based framework proposed in this paper can effectively reduce aviation CO 2 emissions and mitigate the effects of global warming. • An aviation CO 2 emissions prediction model is proposed considering both microscopic flight dynamics and macroscopic traffic demand. • A more efficient market-based CO 2 emission reduction framework is developed based on a two-phase carbon trading model by means of taxation and cap-and-trade. • Case study shows that the proposed method has a more optimal incentive for CO 2 emission reduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Temperature-economic growth relationships are computed to quantify the impact of climate change on the economy. However, model performance and differences of predictions among research complicate the use of climate econometric estimation. Machine learning methods provide an alternative that might improve the predictive effects. However, time series and extrapolation issues constrain methods such as random forests. We apply a simple thought experiment with national marginal GDP growth by aggregating subnational climate impact to alleviate the shortcomings in random forests. This paper uses random forests, multivariate cubic regression, and linear spline regression to examine the direct impacts of temperature on economic development and conducts a performance comparison of the methods. The model results indicate an optimal temperature of 15°C, 15°C or 21°C for each model. Furthermore, a thought experiment indicates that the marginal predictions of national GDP changes by approximately 1%, −3%, or −6% for models with 1°C warming. The performance comparison suggests that random forests have stable model performance and better prediction performance in bootstrapping. However, the extrapolation problem in random forests causes underestimation of climate impact in 5% of cells under 6°C warming. Overall, our results suggest that temperature should be considered in economic projections under climate change scenarios. We also suggest the use of more machine learning methods in climate impact assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agro-pastoral ecotone of northern China is the prominent area for agricultural production, but it is also the most typical ecological fragile area with frequent drought disasters. Taking Yulin City at Shaanxi Province in China as the case area, the paper aims to investigate the spatio-temporal changes of agricultural vulnerability to drought in China's agro-pastoral ecotone in the period 2000 to 2020. The results show that: 1) the agricultural vulnerability to drought in Yulin City has shifted from high vulnerability in the period 2000–2010 to low vulnerability in the period 2011–2020. 2) There exist obvious spatio-temporal differences of the agricultural vulnerability to drought in Yulin City during the research period. 3) Four sensitive events and 14 resilient events were identified in the research and the crops of Yulin had become more resilient to drought. Finally, the paper put forward with policy implications to make adaptive strategies of agriculture to climate change in China's agro-pastoral ecotone in the future, e.g., carrying out agricultural zoning based on agricultural production conditions, intensifying the construction of disaster prevention and relief system, and integrating with modern agricultural technology to develop new type agriculture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Changing climate has altered the trends and variability of precipitation and temperature globally and thereby increasing the risk of natural and social disasters, especially in coastal climatic transitional zones such as the Huaihe river basin (HRB). This paper applies the Empirical Quantile Mapping (EQM) method for bias correction and systematically evaluates the performance of the 30 Global climate models (GCMs) of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 6 (CMIP6) in simulating precipitation and temperature over the Huaihe river basin (HRB) for 1979–2014. A suitable multi-model ensemble subset (BMME) is selected based on the Euclidean Distance (ED) synthetic metric. Results show that in comparison to the baseline period 1995–2014, precipitation (temperature) over HRB is projected to increase at the rate of around 15 mm/decade (0.1 °C/decade), 16 mm/decade (0.3 °C/decade), 20 mm/decade (0.5 °C/decade), and 15 mm/decade (0.6 °C/decade) for the period 2015–2100, under Shared Socioeconomic Pathways SSP1-2.6, SSP2-4.5, SSP3-7.0, and SSP5-8.5, respectively. In the long-term (2081–2100), the annual precipitation is projected to increase by 32%, 27%, 35%, and 26%, under the four scenarios, respectively. The temperature is projected to remain stable or slightly decrease under SSP1-2.6 (2 °C) and SSP2-4.5 (3 °C), while will keep rising and increasing by 6 °C under SSP5-8.5 and by 4 °C under SSP3-7.0 by 2100. The isotherm and isohyet are projected to shift northwest from southeastern coastal China to inland in the future, which is likely associated with the northwestward shift of the western Pacific anticyclone in summer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China has established and assigned target responsibilities for local officials in energy conservation and created an evaluation indicator, which is a key institutional arrangement that provides local officials with political incentives to promote carbon abatement policies. In this paper, we elaborate on the relationship between China's target responsibility system and CO2 emissions using interprovincial panel data, grouping provinces into Eastern, Central and Western regions to compare China's CO2 emissions convergence between the periods of the 10th Five-year Plan and the 11th Five-year Plan. The analysis indicates that the target responsibility system does not noticeably change local officials' political incentives to engage in carbon abatement because the effect of the target responsibility system for energy conservation seems to be overshadowed by and subject to gross domestic product (GDP) growth targets. Against the backdrop of growing international pressure on climate change issues, this paper argues that China must include in the target responsibility system an indicator of absolute CO2 emissions reduction as a policy objective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyze and map the main areas of the Circular Economy literature of the first two decades of 21st century, offering a broad vision about the growth of the theme during these years. Design/methodology/approach: The research was divided into two stages: the first was a systematic review of literature and the second consisted on generation and analysis of bibliographic maps. Findings: The publication indicates the prominence of China and European Union countries in the production of articles about Circular Economy. Furthermore, the topic is restricted to academic area, and that research on Circular Economy is still very focused on theory studies, even with exponential growth in the number of published articles about the theme since 2015. Finally, it also provides a collection of information as the principal authors, the most cited publications, citations, co-citations and countries that have most published beyond which are the most discussed topics. Research limitations/implications: A possible limitation of the research is that it was performed only in the Scopus database. It may be suggested as future searches that other databases are included as well, and another suggestion is to reduce the time period between research samples due to the exponential increase in the number of publications and topics discussed lately. Practical implications: The results of this paper can guide future researches about the development of Circular Economy during the next decades or years and serve as a facilitator for researchers and for managers that want to know more about the topic. Originality/value: A mapping of the principal players and main discussions about Circular Economy made in the first two decades of the 21st century and an analysis about the growth and changes about the theme. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tea (Camellia sinensis L.), as one of the most important cash crops in China, plays an important role in increasing farmers' incomes and guaranteeing a high quality of life. Tea production has been greatly influenced by both climate change and economic development in China. However, without a scientific understanding of the interaction mechanism of climate change and the impetus from rapid economic development on tea production practices in China, it is difficult to take adaptive actions to meet the climate change challenges for the tea industry. In this paper, we firstly assessed the potential impacts of climate change on tea climate suitability by empirical formula calculation using meteorological data; then, the effects from the additional climatic stress due to warming on tea production were detected with the annual statistical tea yield record on a municipal level. The contribution of socioeconomic development to the tea industry was evaluated with the comparison of the movement of China's national economy's and tea industry's gravity center during the period of 1987–2017. Finally, a conceptual adaptation framework was built to demonstrate the interaction mechanisms between climate change, tea production, and the economic development. The results showed that there was a negative impact of climate change on tea production in mainland China, with the percentage of high tea climate suitability (>0.9) areas dropping by 45% to 32%, while opportunities of enlarging the tea cultivating area emerged in the north tea production region where the tea climate suitability increased. We found that the tea planting area expanded northwards from 33° N in 1987 to 35° N in 2017 to take advantage of the favorable climatic resources due to warming, and tea planting decreased at an altitude of 100–400 m while increasing to higher altitude of 400–2000 m to avoid hot temperature damage and seek the optimum environment in high mountainous areas for tea production. In addition, the tea production moved westward along the longitude, decreasing obviously at 117–121° E while increasing significantly at 98–104° E and 107–110° E. Meanwhile, the tea production gravity center showed a westward movement consistent with the national economic gravity center moving trend, which means that tea industry development was driven by multiple socioeconomic factors and climatic forcings. A conceptual framework was built in this paper, aiming to show a robust adaptation mechanism for the tea system to maximize the benefits and minimize the damages from the altered climatic resources under rapid economic development in mainland China. The results in this study would help deepen the understanding of the adaptation process and practices for tea production in mainland China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the relationship between climate change and the spatial distribution of population in China. We establish a two-way fixed effects model to investigate the role of temperature difference in the spatial distribution of China's population. We find that the annual variation of temperature has an impact on city size in both large and small cities, and that city size tends to shrink as the temperature difference increases. Meanwhile, we also find that the population in the cities located south of Qinling-Huaihe Line and Aihui-Tengchong Line (Hu's Line) is more sensitive to temperature effects, and that the temperature difference has a significant negative effect on city size. Similarly, the same results are found for prefecture-level cities with low administrative levels. Considering the endogeneity between temperature change and city size, we adopt an instrumental variable using latitude to perform a more robust empirical analysis, the results of a series of robustness tests support these conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rubber plantations are among the most important in the world's tropical regions. They play a positive role in carbon sequestration and in delaying climate change, supplying strategic resources of natural rubber (NR), and aiding in poverty alleviation and rural revitalisation. This paper reviews six methods of research on carbon sinks in rubber plantations: the biomass inventory method, the biomass conversion factor continuous function method, the trade potential of carbon sinks method, the calculation method for carbon storage of rubber latex, the eddy covariance method, and the remote sensing image model method. This study clarifies the carbon sink assessment and enhancement model for rubber plantations and describes the composition of the carbon pool, which includes the aboveground and belowground vegetation biomass carbon pools, litter carbon pool, latex carbon pool, and soil carbon pool. It also examines influencing factors such as tree age, global climate change, and human disturbance, as well as improvement pathways including afforestation, fertilisation, irrigation, and tapping, and evaluation methods like field surveys, positional observations, remote sensing monitoring, and model simulation. Research on carbon sequestration in rubber plantations faces challenges, including the unclear dynamics of carbon sources and sequestration, uncertain spatial and temporal patterns, and the long-term lack of accurate monitoring of carbon sinks and technologies for increasing sinks and reducing emissions. Future research should focus on the methodology of rubber plantation carbon sequestration projects, the dynamics of carbon sequestration, and the spatial allocation pattern of carbon sequestration in rubber plantations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Super oil and gas basins provide the energy foundation for social progress and human development. In the context of climate change and carbon peak and carbon neutrality goals, constructing an integrated energy and carbon neutrality system that balances energy production and carbon reduction becomes crucial for the transformation of such basins. Under the framework of a green and intelligent energy system primarily based on "four news", new energy, new electricity, new energy storage, and new intelligence, integrating a "super energy system" composed of a huge amount of underground resources of coal, oil, gas and heat highly overlapping with abundant wind and solar energy resources above ground, and a regional intelligent energy consumption system with coordinated development and utilization of fossil energy and new energy, with a carbon neutrality system centered around carbon cycling is essential. This paper aims to select the traditional oil and gas basins as "super energy basins" with the conditions to build world-class energy production and demonstration bases for carbon neutrality. The Ordos Basin has unique regional advantages, including abundant fossil fuel and new energy resources, as well as matching CO2 sources and sinks, position it as a carbon neutrality "super energy basin" which explores the path of transformation of traditional oil and gas basins. Under the integrated development concept and mode of "coal + oil + gas + new energy + carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS)/carbon capture and storage (CCS)", the carbon neutrality in super energy basin is basically achieved, which enhance energy supply and contribute to the carbon peak and carbon neutrality goals, establish a modern energy industry and promote regional green and sustainable development. The pioneering construction of the world-class carbon neutrality "super energy system" demonstration basin in China represented by the Ordos Basin will reshape the new concept and new mode of exploration and development of super energy basins, which is of great significance to the global energy revolution under carbon neutrality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

G20 countries, account for the majority of global carbon emissions, need to take the lead in mitigating climate change. However, there are differences in economic, political and sociocultural backgrounds amongst G20 countries, especially between China and other G20 countries. Since the implementation of climate policies largely require domestic public support, it is vital to explore similarities and differences of public opinions on climate issues between China and other G20 countries. However, little research has investigated the micro-level climate concerns from the perspective of cross-country differences. Therefore, based on big data and text mining analysis, this study crawled user-generated data on Sina Weibo (N = 271,487) and Twitter (N = 4,874,546) from 2008 to 2019 to comprehensively catalog and compare climate opinions. Results show that climate change has become a salient issue in China and other G20 countries, with climate-related surges in public opinions always occurring after major natural, social and political events. Moreover, in China, there has been a significant shift in public attention from climate impacts to climate mitigation strategies, but in other G20 countries, people are more radical by emphasizing the climate movement and calling for authoritative actions. This study provides "snapshots" of climate communication and offers a quantification-based reference for promoting climate actions and collaborative governance., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

The Chengbi River Basin is a typical karst watershed in Southwest China. Understanding the effects of climate change (CC) and human activities (HAs) on hydrological process is important for regional water resources management and water security. However, a comprehensive assessment of the effects of CC and HAs on runoff dynamics at different time scales in the Chengbi River Basin is still lacking. To address these needs, we used Budyko Mezentsev-Choudhurdy-Yang and Slope change ratio of accumulative quantity methods to assess the contribution of the changing environment to annual and intra-annual runoff changes in the Chengbi River Basin. The results indicated that annual runoff time series was divided into the base phase Ta (1980-1996) and the change phase Tb (1997-2019). Compared to the natural status in Ta, the relative contributions of CC and HAs to the runoff increase in Tb were 154.86% and -54.86%. In addition, the shift in intra-annual runoff occurred in 2007 and was mainly caused by HAs, with a contribution rate of 76.22%. The increase in annual runoff in Tb could be attributed to the positive contribution of rainfall. Changes in rainfall and reservoir construction altered the original state of intra-annual runoff. Furthermore, the high degree of heterogeneity in the surface karst zone increased the runoff coefficient. The spatial unsaturation of the subsurface water-bearing media and rainfall patterns caused a significant lag effect in the response of surface runoff to rainfall. This study can help researchers and policy makers to better understand the response of karst runoff to changing environment and provide insights for future water resources management and flood control measures., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Clean energy conversion is a core approach and development trend to tackle climate change, while the severe drawbacks such as supply deficiency and cost increase restrict regional sustainable development. This paper employs a natural experiment of coal-to-gas conversion of the Chinese government to study the effect of such policy on regional sustainable development, as well as the underlying mechanism. Based on a city-level dataset from 2006 to 2019, this paper measure green total factor productivity (GTFP) using data envelopment analysis (DEA) combined with the Malmquist‒Luenberger productivity index. Then, this paper evaluates the impact of the CTG policy in pilot cities using the Difference-in-Difference (DID) with Propensity Score Matching (PSM) approach. This paper finds that the CTG policy increased the GTFP of the pilot cities by 2.25% (0.0229/1.02). A series of robustness tests confirmed the findings. Subsequent mechanism analysis shows that the CTG policy increases the GTFP of pilot cities mainly by increasing technical efficiency. In addition, the mechanism of the CTG policy's impact differs between central and noncentral cities. In particular, the CTG policy increases the technological innovation indicator (TC) of provincial capital cities by 2.35% while it increases the technical efficiency indicator (EC) of other cities by 1.89%, which proves the Porter effect in provincial capital cities. Finally, several implications are provided for policymakers to promote other types of renewable energy., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Only with the three largest emitters (the EU, China and the US) building a coalition was it possible to conclude the Paris Agreement in 2015. With the announced withdrawal of the US, the interdependence between the EU and China has increased significantly. Both actors have reiterated their will to implement the Paris Agreement and to cooperate on climate change. In times of political constraints between the EU and China, this seems puzzling. The paper takes a role‐theoretic perspective to assess the following question: How can the changing roles of the EU and China, ascribed to them by external and internal expectations, explain their increased climate cooperation? It draws on a qualitative text analysis of policy documents and expert interviews. The paper concludes with a discussion of the findings against the backdrop of growing tensions between the EU and China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Streamflow in semiarid areas, especially in North China, was rapidly decreasing, which made it important to analyze the characteristics and influencing factors of streamflow. Using the hydro-meteorological data series of 1961–2017 in the upper Yongding River Basin (UYRB) (including the Yang River Basin (YRB) and Sanggan River Basin (SRB)), spatio-temporal variation characteristics of air temperature, precipitation, and potential evapotranspiration (E0) were analyzed. The results showed that precipitation has no significant trend; the temperature showed a significant increase of 0.1–0.5 °C per decade; E0 showed a significant decrease of approximately −2 mm/10yr (in 18 stations); the estimated rates of streamflow change were −7 and −8 mm/10yr for SRB and YRB. As for spatial distribution, the YRB presented a higher E0 value than the SRB; the mountain areas had more precipitation than the plain areas. The change points of streamflow occurred in 1982 and 2003. Both the Budyko and the DMC methods were used to evaluate the impacts of climate change and human activities on the mean annual streamflow. In variation stage I (1983~2003), impacts of human activities account for 90.6% and 62.7% of the mean annual streamflow changes in YRB and SRB, respectively. In variation stage II (2004~2017), the percentages were 99.5% and 93.5%, respectively. It is also noted that the first change point in streamflow was indeed at the beginning of China's land reform, when the farmers could manage their reallocated lands and, therefore, there was an increase in agricultural water consumption. The second change point coincided with "Capital Water Resources Planning", including water conservation projects and irrigation district construction programs. In general, human activities were mainly responsible for the significant decline in the annual streamflow of UYRB. This paper will provide valuable results for water resources planning and give guidance on the construction of water conservation function areas and ecological environment support areas in the capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the acceleration of the global response to climate change, increasing attention has been paid to the risks associated with climate change mitigation, such as regulation uncertainties and market interactions. As the country with the greatest CO2 emissions globally, China has launched a national carbon market to speed up its climate mitigation. While the national carbon market provides a platform for regional coalitions to reduce emissions, its incomplete sectoral coverage might allow for the strategic behavior of industries in different regions and ultimately affect the efficiency of the carbon market. This paper explores how the sectoral expansion of the national carbon market affects regional emission reductions in China when emissions trading sectors engage in strategic behavior in the output market. From the sectoral perspective, our numerical results show that the strategic effect in the electricity and steel sectors is more significant than in other sectors. From a regional perspective, the western regions of China, which are mostly permit sale regions, have less strategic power than the eastern regions in the output and carbon markets. Finally, this paper suggests that measures, such as the dynamic adjustment of emission allowance allocation, should be considered by policy makers to prevent the widening of regional economic disparities when extending the sectoral coverage of the carbon market in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Though the United States and China emphasize the significance of multilateral frameworks, they have not departed from power politics. As the confrontation between U.S.-led and Chinese-style multilateralism intensifies, the practice of multilateral cooperation based on openness and responsibility is losing ground. In this context, this paper compares U.S.-led multilateralism and Chinese-style multilateralism to examine U.S.-China rivalry in multilateral mechanisms. It then zooms in on the rivalry in the context of the Indo-Pacific region. U.S. President Biden's key strategy in his China policy is represented by the catchphrase "cooperate, compete, confront," dubbed the "3C framework," reflecting the complexities of U.S.-China relations. While the two states tend to show a mix of competition and cooperation relative to global multilateral mechanisms, they exhibit a mix of competition and conflict in the Indo-Pacific. The paper analyzes recent United States and Chinese approaches towards topical multilateral issues: on climate change issues for the former and on cybersecurity and advanced technology for the latter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of global warming, snow cover changes have an extremely important impact on the hydrological cycle and the redistribution of water resources in arid and semi-arid regions. In this paper, based on the daily cloud-free snow area remote sensing product data in the source region of Yangtze River (SRYR) from 2000 to 2019, the snow phenology variables such as the snow cover day (SCD), snow onset date (SOD), snow end date (SED), and snow duration day (SDD) were extracted separately for each hydrological year, and the vertical distribution of snow cover area (SCA) in the SRYR was analyzed by combining with the digital elevation model (DEM). In addition, we also combined climate factors and land cover types to further explore the spatiotemporal variation characteristics of snow phenology in response to different influencing factors, in order to reveal the spatiotemporal variation patterns of snow cover in the SRYR. The results showed that: (1) The SCA in the SRYR has a more obvious vertical distribution, with the maximum SCA reaching 61.58% at high elevation, while at low elevation, the SCA is mostly below 20%. The distribution of SCD in the study area showed a significant exponential correlation with DEM (R2 = 0.87). (2) The area of SOD in the SRYR showed an advanced trend of about 63.37%, while the area of SED showed a delayed trend of about 69.59%, and the area which showed significant trends is 4.29% and 4.36%, respectively. Therefore, the trends of both SOD and SED showed insignificant changes. (3) Temperature change is the main factor affecting the change of snow cover in the SRYR. Among them, 90.9% of the regions showed a significant positive correlation between temperature and SCD, while precipitation showed a significant negative correlation with SCD in about 75.3% of the total area of SRYR. Under the stable snow area (SCD > 60), the land cover type is glacial or permanent snow about 1.5 × 103 km2, which covers almost the entire glacial or permanent snow of the SRYR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the life-cycle wind resistant performance of a constructed long-span suspension bridge in the coastal region of China, aiming to quantify the multisource time-variant effects and uncertainties and offering a reference for designs of long-span bridges in the future. Randomness from modal frequencies, damping ratios, and identification uncertainty of flutter derivatives (FDs) was considered; then, their effects on probability of flutter failure and probability of exceeding the predefined buffeting response root-mean square (RMS) are discussed. Firstly, results of full-track tropical cyclone (TC) simulation under various climate warming scenarios are reviewed; then, the time-variant probability density function (PDF) of annual extreme wind speed is discussed. Secondly, 6-year modal frequencies and damping ratios of a long-span suspension bridge with a center-slotted section were extracted by fast Bayesian FFT method with structural health monitoring (SHM) data, which were utilized to explore the deterioration rules of structural properties. Thirdly, FDs were modeled from a probabilistic perspective based on complex Wishart distribution, which were identified in the turbulent flow and the frequency domain by Bayesian inference. The posterior distributions of FDs, namely identification uncertainty, were quantified by Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) sampling. This paper finds that for flutter resistant performance, the time-variant effects (i.e., modal frequencies and PDFs of extreme wind speed) will make the flutter failure probability seven times larger than the initial value; for the probability of exceeding the predefined buffeting response RMS, however, the time-variant effects will make a negligible difference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The problem of global climate change is a common problem faced by all countries, and developing countries will face heavier pressure to reduce carbon emissions while promoting economic development. China is currently in a period of economic transformation, and the contradiction of industrial structure upgrading is becoming more and more prominent. The unreasonable industrial structure has caused a large consumption of resources, hindering the optimal allocation of resources and affecting carbon emissions. Technological innovation is an important force to cope with environmental changes, promote economic growth, and improve comprehensive competitiveness. Can technological innovation achieve carbon emission reduction under industrial structure upgrading? In this paper, industrial structure upgrading, technological innovation, and carbon emissions are studied together, and the impact of industrial structure upgrading, technological innovation on carbon emissions is theoretically analyzed, as well as how industrial structure upgrading acts on carbon emissions through technological innovation. An empirical test is conducted using 30 provincial panel data in China from 2005 to 2017, and it is found that industrial structure upgrading can reduce carbon emissions. An econometric analysis based on the mediating effect model finds that industrial structure upgrading has both a direct carbon emission reduction effect and a mediating effect of reducing carbon emissions through technological innovation, and the mediating effect of technological innovation in reducing carbon emissions remains significant in the regression analysis of sub-regions. Based on the research of this paper, it is suggested that the advanced development of industrial structure should be promoted, the rationalization of industrial structure should be promoted, the innovation development strategy should be firmly implemented, and the level of technological innovation should be promoted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To achieve carbon peak targets, realize carbon neutrality vision, and tackle global climate change, China must improve the carbon emission performance at the city level. Based on the carbon emission performance of 191 prefecture-level cities in China from 1997 to 2017, this paper analyses the evolution characteristics of urban carbon emission performance from three aspects: the overall spatial and temporal evolution, the differences according to both region and city size, and the differences among clusters categorized by carbon emission performance at the city level. This paper also reveals the impact of the social and economic transition on China's carbon emission performance. The results show that: (1) The overall level of carbon emission performance of Chinese cities is low, and there is a downward trend during the study period. The differences in carbon emission performance among cities are convergent, but there is a wide gap between high and low values. (2) The carbon emission performance of cities in eastern coastal areas is higher than that in non-coastal areas cities. Large urban agglomerations and economically developed regions, such as provincial capitals, are the agglomeration areas of high urban carbon emission performance values. (3) The carbon emission performance level of cities with similar sizes will converge. At the same time, such changes will enhance the differences among carbon emission performances at the city level within the same region. (4) Cities that belong to high urban carbon emission performance clusters are mainly distributed in the eastern region. Such cities are classified into large cities, supercities, and megacities. Compared with low urban carbon emission performance clusters, cities in high urban carbon emission performance clusters show a higher proportion in the medium-high level and high level of carbon emission performance. Moreover, cities in high urban carbon emission performance clusters are more likely to improve theirurban carbon emission performance. (5) The economic agglomeration effect, industrial structure adjustment and carbon intensity reduction have a significant impact on improving urban carbon emission performance. Population agglomeration has an incremental effect, and the anticipated benefits of environmental regulation have yet to be fully realized. The impacts of different clusters and different regions are variable. Finally, this paper advances policy enlightenment according to its research findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simple Summary: This paper analyzed the different relationships between earlywood and latewood as well as total tree-ring growth and the climate factors and reconstructed 106 years of May–June mean temperature (TMJ) in the Tongbai Mountains based on the earlywood width chronology of Pinus taiwanensis Hayata. It also analyzed the linkages to the Indian and Pacific Oceans. This paper found that earlywood width chronology has better response to the climate factors than latewood width and total tree-ring width. This study also found that the main limiting factors that restrained radial growth of Pinus taiwanensis Hayata in the Tongbai Mountains were May–June mean temperature and mean maximum temperature. The reconstructed TMJ series have a better reliability and are significantly negatively correlated with sea surface temperature (SST) over the tropical Western Pacific Ocean and Indian Ocean and are significantly positively correlated with SST over the subtropical Pacific Ocean. Finally, the periodic fluctuations of TMJ in the Tongbai Mountains might be related to the quasi-biennial interannual oscillation of SST over the Indo-Pacific equatorial region (QBO). The results of this study are significant for further understanding and exploring forest growth and climate change in the climatic transition zone. The Tongbai Mountains are an ecologically sensitive region to climate change, where there lies a climatic transitional zone from a subtropical to a warm–temperate monsoon climate. The northern boundary of Pinus taiwanensis Hayata is here; thus, climate information is well recorded in its tree rings. Based on developed earlywood width (EWW), latewood width (LWW) and total ring width (RW) chronologies (time period: 1887–2014 year) of Pinus taiwanensis Hayata in the Tongbai Mountains in central China, this paper analyzed characteristics of these chronologies and correlations between these chronologies and climate factors. The correlation results showed that earlywood width chronology contains more climate information than latewood width chronology and total ring width chronology, and mean temperature and mean maximum temperature in May–June were the main limiting factors for radial growth of Pinus taiwanensis Hayata. The highest significant value in all correlation analyses is −0.669 (p < 0.05) between earlywood width chronology and May–June mean temperature (TMJ) in the pre-mutation period (1958–2005) based on mutating in 2006. Thus, this paper reconstructed May–June mean temperature using earlywood width chronology from 1901 to 2005 (reliable period of earlywood width chronology is 1901–2014). The reconstructed May–June mean temperature experienced eight warmer periods and eight colder periods and also showed 2–3a cycle change over the past 105 years. The spatial correlation showed that the reconstructed series was representative of the May–June mean temperature variation in central and eastern China and significant positive/negative correlation with the sea surface temperature (SST) of the subtropical Pacific Ocean and the tropical Western Pacific Ocean and Indian Ocean from the previous October to the current June. This also indicated that May–June mean temperature periodic fluctuations might be related to the quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO) in the tropical Western Pacific Ocean and Indian Ocean. The results of this study have extended and supplemented the meteorological records of the Tongbai Mountains and have a guiding significance for forest tending and management in this area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chinese government has established carbon emissions trading schemes (CETS) to cope with climate change and reduce carbon emissions. This paper uses the multi-period difference in difference (DID) model to explore the impact of CETS on cities' GDP and GDP growth rates in China based on data from 285 prefecture-level cities from 2008–2019. We find that CETS increase the level of GDP by 3.4% and the GDP growth rate by 0.004. The mechanism of increasing GDP includes promoting investment and innovation, and the mechanism of increasing the GDP growth rate includes only promoting the investment growth rate. Thus, CETS satisfy both the weak and strong versions of the Porter Hypothesis from the GDP and growth rate perspectives. In the heterogeneity analysis, we find that the impacts of CETS on cities' GDP and GDP growth rates decrease with the increase of the corresponding dependent variable. In the spatial spillover analysis, we find that the establishment of CETS has a positive spillover effect on the GDP of cities around 50 km and 150 km, and a negative spillover effect on the GDP of cities around 200 km, but there is no spatial spillover effect on the GDP growth rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change is directly linked to a broad array of changes because of disorganized activities within the economic system and human intervention. Climate change affects the well-being status of both non-living and living things. Relevant policies to mitigate and adapt to climate change conditions concentrate on solutions that intend to use renewable energy instead of fossil fuels or other conventional energy sources. This study aims to process a review focused on how renewables advance environmental quality and create relevant benefits within severe economic activities. This study elaborates on the case of China for two main reasons. First, China has a pivotal role in the economic system worldwide. Second, China is making serious attempts to transition into a low-carbon economy. An integrative review was processed to receive selected publications. The advantage of this process is that it considers empirical and non-empirical studies, policy papers, and conceptual frameworks. Inclusion and exclusion criteria were applied to retrieve the final number of publications. Review results from 39 well-acknowledged Journals provided 180 selected publications categorized into seven study groups: data analyses, model optimization studies, market issues, renewable energy technology publications, nuclear energy publications, ocean energy publications, and policy-related studies. Policy implications concern China's efforts to accelerate the integration of renewables in the energy mix. Hence, the country should increase energy efficiency in consumption and process investment plans based on robust research and development efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The arid endorheic basin of northwest China is characterized by rich land resources, water shortage, and a fragile ecological environment. The establishment of a credible coupling model of groundwater and surface water based on multi-source observation data is an effective means to study the change in basin water cycles and the sustainable utilization of water resources in the past and future. Based on the latest understanding of hydrogeological conditions, hydrology and water resource utilization data in the middle reaches of the Heihe River Basin (HRB), this paper constructs an up-to-date coupling model of surface water and groundwater to study the water balance change of the basin. The water resources data series under historical replay and CMIP5 climate model prediction are constructed to predict future changes in water resources. The study shows that, under the joint influence of natural conditions and human activities, the average annual recharge of groundwater in the study area from 1990 to 2020 is 17.98 × 108 m3/a, the average annual discharge is 18.62 × 108 m3/a, and the difference between recharge and discharge is −0.64 × 108 m3/a. The total groundwater storage is −19.99 × 108 m3, of which the groundwater storage from 1990 to 2001 was −17.52 × 108 m3 and from 2002 to 2020 was −2.47 × 108 m3. Abundant water from 2002 to 2020 in the basin significantly improved the loss of groundwater storage. Under the prediction of historical reappearance and the CMIP5 CNRM-CM5 model RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 pathways, the groundwater level of the Heihe River–Liyuanhe River inclined plain falls first because the HRB has just experienced a wet season and then rises according to future climate change. The groundwater level of the inclined plain east of the Heihe River and Yanchi basin decreases continuously because of the change in water cycle caused by human activities. The erosion accumulation plain is located in the groundwater discharge zone, and the water level is basically stable. Under the conditions of water resource development and utilization, the runoff of Zhengyixia hydrological station cannot meet the requirements of the "97 Water Dividing Plan" of the State Council in most years in the future, and the ecological and production water in the lower reaches of HRB cannot be effectively guaranteed. With the implementation of water-saving irrigation under the RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 scenarios, the runoff of Zhengyixia can meet the "97 Water Diversion Plan". It is suggested to further improve the level of agricultural water savings in the middle reaches of the HRB and control the reasonable scale of cultivated land in order to reduce water consumption in the middle reaches of the HRB and implement sustainable utilization of water resources in the HRB. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China has established three rounds of low-carbon pilot city initiatives. However, a gap exists between policy making and successful implementation, and the effects on greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction were found to be different among pilots. This paper considers the question of how low-carbon policies in cities can be implemented effectively and how policy combinations are adopted for GHG emissions reduction. It uses a mixed research approach, including Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) and field investigation in Pilot Y (situated in the southwest China). The results show that, first, financial support and monitoring systems are necessary conditions, while political leadership is a sufficient condition. This means that the absence of financial support or monitoring systems could lead to increased GHG emissions, while the presence of political leadership always promotes the reduction of GHG emissions but may not be sufficient on its own to achieve them. Second, the target responsibility system (TRS) – a system used by higher government levels to assess the policy implementation of lower government levels – and human resource mechanisms cannot effectively lead to the promotion of GHG emissions reduction. Finally, in the absence of TRS and human resource mechanisms, environmental information disclosure (EID) was found to effectively promote low-carbon urban development by encouraging public participation. This paper reveals the complexity of the implementation of low-carbon policies in cities, identifies the link between city-level and national action, and enriches the theoretical explanation of governance and low-carbon policy implementation gaps in China. Key policy insights China's low-carbon pilot city project is critical for reducing GHG emissions, however, the effects of the low-carbon pilot city programmes varied greatly. Financial support and monitoring systems are necessary conditions, while political leadership is a sufficient condition to achieve cities' GHG emissions reduction goals. Local low-carbon development is limited and not put into practice at the city level in China, in part because of the absence of financial support and limited political attention. This study highlights the key conditions of organizational behaviour at the meso-level, and enriches the theoretical explanation of environmental policy implementation gaps in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Qinghai–Tibet Plateau is a unique global natural geographical unit with a high altitude and fragile ecology, where land cover change has been affecting its regional ecological security and sustainable development. The plateau covers nine countries with different variations in climate change and human activities, which cause significant spatial variations in its land cover change. This paper uses land cover data to reveal the spatiotemporal characteristics and multi-country differences in land cover change on the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau from 1992 to 2020 by applying spatiotemporal characteristic analysis and mapping methods. The results show that grassland (65.70%), bare land (15.56%), and woodland (10.25%) are the main types of land cover on the plateau, accounting for 91.51% of the total area. The interconversion of bare land and grassland was dominant in 1992–2020, with an area share of 67.83%. The turning point year of grassland change occurred in 2015. The grassland area increased by 6312 km2 in 1992–2015, while it decreased by 14,646 km2 in the plateau in 2015–2020. The areas of woodland, cropland, and water increased by 2.77%, 5.85%, and 7.57%, respectively, and the area of built-up land increased from 299.17 km2 to 1206.29 km2. Overall, a warming and wetting trend of the climate in the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau has driven the expansion of natural vegetation and water in the central plateau within China, with its natural vegetation area increasing by 0.11%. However, the development of regional warming and drying caused local grassland degradation, where Kyrgyzstan and India within the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau experienced the most prominent vegetation degradation. Human activities are relatively frequent in the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau within China and India, causing higher growth rates of built-up land and cropland than in other countries. The establishment of reserves and effective forest management policies have led to significant increases in woodland areas in China and Nepal within the plateau, while weak forest management and limited investment in forest conservation have led to high rates of deforestation in India and Myanmar. Accelerated temperature rises and regional differences in precipitation are the main drivers of large-scale land cover change on the plateau and differences in human activities and land use policies are responsible for the dramatic and diverse localized land cover change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chinese government's use of fiscal policy, which includes fiscal income and spending, is crucial in its fight against environmental pollution and climate change. Innovation‐driven has arisen as a new alternative to reconcile economic success with environmental conservation in light of tighter resource restrictions and the suggestion of the Chinese High‐quality Development policy. The paper uses an econometric model to examine the connection between institutional resource consumption efficiency and carbon neutrality, using a data set consisting of Chinese inter‐provincial panel data from 2007 to 2020 as a research sample; fiscal decentralization is also discussed as a potential moderating factor. Collaborative innovation positively boosts ecological efficiency and produces geographical spillovers, and the findings suggest so long as the economic distance is considered. When it comes to increasing ecological efficiency, collaborative innovation plays a more important role than financial decentralization alone. Among these is the improvement of carbon neutrality, which is best achieved via the joint promotion of ecological efficiency and industrial organizations. By reducing the intensity of the positive effect of innovative cooperation on ecological efficiency, the moderating effect suggests that fiscal decentralization is a critical factor in this relationship. Promoting China's ecological efficiency necessitates a fair distribution of local budgetary spending. China should also actively encourage the degree of synergy between institutional resource consumption efficiency and associated institutions to improve eco‐efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chinese government continues to contribute to tackling the global climate challenge and plans to continue lowering carbon emissions in the transportation infrastructure field. The comprehensive assessment of the impact of carbon emissions is mainly focused on high-speed railways (HSRs). This paper proposes a life-cycle cost considering carbon emissions (LCCCCE) model for HSR projects, which consists of a general life-cycle cost (GLCC) model and a quantified carbon emissions cost (CEC) model. The Beijing-Shanghai HSR is employed as a case study, in which the LCCCCE and sensitivity of carbon emission factors are analyzed using the proposed methodology. The results show that the LCCCCE of the Beijing-Shanghai HSR is 64.56 billion USD, and that its CEC is 1.04 billion USD, which contributes 1.61% to the LCCCCE. Thus, the LCCCCE analysis of HSRs or transportation infrastructure projects is an effective methodology to quantify the impacts of carbon emissions in China and around the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Building a more resilient response system to climate change for sustainable development and reducing uncertainty in China's food markets, requires access to historical research gaps and mapping future research progress for decision making. However, the lack of quantitative and objective analyses to ensure the stability and development of agroecosystems increases the complexity of agro-climatic mechanisms, which leads to uncertainty and undesirable consequences. In this paper, we review the characteristics of climate change in China (1951–2020), reveal the mechanisms of agroecosystem structure in response to climate, and identify challenges and opportunities for future efforts in the context of research progress. The aim is to improve the scientific validity and relevance of future research by clarifying agro-climatic response mechanisms. The results show that surface temperature, precipitation, and frequency of extreme weather events have increased to varying degrees in major agricultural regions of China in 1951–2020. And they have strong geographic variation, which has resulted in droughts in the north and floods in the south. Moreover, climate change has complicated the mechanisms of soil moisture, Net Primary Productivity (NPP), soil carbon pool, and crop pest structure in agroecosystems. This lends to a reduction in soil water holding capacity, NPP, soil carbon content, and the number of natural enemies of diseases and insects, which in turn affects crop yields. However, human interventions can mitigate the deterioration of these factors. We have also realized that the methodology and theory of historical research poses a great challenge to future agroecosystem. Historical and projected climate trends identified current gaps in interdisciplinary integration and multidisciplinary research required to manage diverse spatio-temporal climate change impacts on agroecosystems. Future efforts should highlight integrated management and decision making, multidisciplinary big data coupling, and numerical simulations to ensure sustainable agricultural development, ecological security, and food security in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global climate changes have led to frequent and recurrent heat stress, which has seriously affected the world maize production. The experiment presented in this paper was carried out during the maize‐growing season in 2021 and 2022 at the Huang–Huai–Hai Region Maize Science and Technology Innovation Center (36°09′N, 117°09′E) in Tai'an, Shandong province, China. The test site is located in the semi‐humid warm temperate continental monsoon climate zone, soil is brown loam. We selected different heat‐sensitive maize varieties: heat‐tolerant variety Zhengdan 958 (ZD958) and heat‐sensitive variety Xianyu335 (XY335) to study the stress effects of high temperature on the development of tassel in the key stage of its differentiation (the 12‐leaf stage, V12). We found that exposure to heat stress during the V12 stage significantly reduced the tassel size and the anther dehiscence area, making it difficult to disperse pollen, thus effectively reducing pollen production. In addition, heat stress had significant negative effects on pollen development, resulting in deformed pollen and lower pollen viability and germination rate. Our results also showed that heat stress significantly increased the activities of key reactive oxygen species‐scavenging enzymes including superoxide dismutase, peroxidase and catalase, and that the malondialdehyde and H2O2 content in tassels exposed to heat stress were significantly higher than those control group, where it should be noted that for the XY335, these effects were more pronounced than for the ZD958. The endogenous hormone content of tassels exhibited a variety of responses. After heat stress, the zeatin and salicylic acid content in tassels of both maize varieties were significantly lower than those in the respective control groups, while the abscisic acid and gibberellin acid content were significantly higher. With respect to the jasmonic acid and 3‐indoleacetic acid content, the two maize varieties exhibited opposite responses: in tassels from ZD958 plants subjected to heat stress were higher than those in the respective control group, while in tassels from XY335 plants, they were lower. The observed changes in protective enzyme activities and endogenous hormone contents induced by heat stress significantly affected the development of maize tassels and significantly reduced the amount, activity and germination rate of pollen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban areas mediate climate transformations and generate new forms of climate urbanism. Looking at climate action in the twelve fastest-growing cities in China with under one million people, this paper proposes a perspective on urban climate politics 'from elsewhere' that foregrounds the potential role of smaller urban areas in mediating climate transformations. The analysis reveals three climate action strategies that reflect practical, institutional, and personal spheres of climate transformations. Planning action in the personal sphere provides opportunities for urban transformations. A perspective 'from elsewhere' calls for greater attention to planning for diverse change strategies for climate transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global climate change caused by greenhouse gas emissions has a direct impact on the sustainable development of human society and has gained widespread concern globally. Biological carbon sequestration measures, mainly forests, are conducive to improving the ecological carbon sink capacity and play an important role in mitigating global climate change. Therefore, assessing the efficiency of forest carbon storage (FCS) is key. In view of the lack of evaluation methods for forest carbon storage efficiency (FCSE) on a large spatial scale and long time series, a method based on Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) was proposed in this paper. The FCS was calculated using the forest storage expansion method, and the FCSE was calculated using the DEA-Malmquist index to solve the dynamic balance between regional forestry economic input and carbon storage output efficiency. The FCSE in Chinese provinces was analyzed. The results showed that from 1999 to 2018, China's FCS increased annually, from 7558.34 million tons to 9476.73 million tons, and the spatial distribution pattern of total FCS was always different among regions. The average TFP value of FCSE was 1.089, which proves that the FCSE in China has been on the rise in the past 20 years, but the efficiency growth differed between provinces and was affected by different factors such as technical efficiency and technological progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Advances in Atmospheric Sciences is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Advances in Atmospheric Sciences is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Long‐range transport and vertical distribution of aerosols are important factors for assessing the uncertainty in aerosol radiative forcing. This paper reveals the vertical distribution and trends of aerosol optical properties in China using 15 years of Cloud‐Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP) data. The Hybrid Single‐Particle Lagrangian integrated trajectory model was used to analyze the transport and trends of aerosols in the layer with the highest occurrence frequencies of dust, polluted dust, polluted continental and elevated smoke aerosols. The results indicated that (a) there were significant regional and seasonal differences in the vertical distribution of aerosols. The aerosol optical depth (AOD) trend in a given region depends on the changes in the aerosol type with the highest frequency and the layer corresponding to the largest AOD in the vertical profile. The frequency of polluted dust aerosols was the highest in Beijing‐Tianjin‐Hebei (BTH) and Central China. The considerable decrease in the 0–2 km AOD led to a significant trend of the column AOD. (b) The changes of AOD and main aerosol types in a region are also affected by the changes of aerosol sources and long‐range transport pathways. In the BTH, dust aerosols originated from the Mongolian Plateau, accounting for 57.88% of the total trajectories. The Pearl River Delta was dominated by elevated smoke aerosols, with trajectories mainly originating from the Myanmar and Vietnam, accounting for 27.38% and 29.59%, respectively. The trend of 15‐year backward trajectories of dust aerosols on the Tibetan Plateau indicated that the trajectory from India is increasing. Plain Language Summary: Aerosols are one of the main factors affecting global climate change, influencing global radiation through direct and indirect effects. Long‐range transport aerosols and their vertical distribution are important factors for assessing the uncertainty in aerosol radiative forcing. At present, there is limited research on the vertical distribution and transport pathways of different types of aerosols in multiple regions over China. Considering that aerosols in different regions of China exhibit large vertical distribution and transport differences, we revealed the vertical distribution and trends of aerosol optical properties in China using 15 years of Cloud‐Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization data. The Hybrid Single‐Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory model was used to analyze the transport and trends of different aerosols. We found significant regional and seasonal differences in the vertical distributions of aerosols. The changes in the aerosol optical depth and main aerosol types in a given region were also significantly affected by the changes in aerosol transport sources and transport pathways. This study provides comprehensive insight into the vertical distribution and transport characteristics of different types of atmospheric aerosols in the Chinese region over the last 15 years, which is very important to further evaluation of the impact of different aerosol types on the radiative effects and the environment. Key Points: The vertical distribution of aerosol optical properties exhibits notable seasonal and regional differences using 15 years of Cloud‐Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP) dataThe trend of total aerosol optical depth (AOD) mainly depends on the joint changes of the highest frequency aerosol and the maximum AOD layer in a vertical profileThe changes of AOD and main aerosol types in a region are also affected by the changes of aerosol transport sources and transport pathways [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]