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Nowadays, the challenges of energy depletion, environmental pollution and food security caused by extensive agriculture development are attracting global attention. In China, the construction of ecological farms is a key initiative to effectuate the goal of peaking carbon dioxide emissions and achieving carbon neutrality, contributing to high-quality agricultural development. Based on this, this study selects the national-level ecological farms directories issued by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs (MARA) of China in 2021 and 2022, and collects the corresponding economic, social and physical geographic data for GIS spatial analysis and Geodetector. The results are as follows: (1) The distribution of ecological farms in various provinces of China is uneven and spatially clustered. It generally presents a 'high in the east and low in the west with concentrated cores' pattern. The construction scope significantly expanded over time, and the high-value areas of nuclear density are concentrated in East China, with the development core transitioned from East China to Central China. (2) Environmental conditions, industrial foundation, economic and social development level, science and technology level and financial support all significantly affect the spatial distribution of ecological farms in China, among which the science and technology level has the most significant enhancement effect on other factors. (3) Environmental conditions provide the construction basis for ecological farms, while economic and social development level and financial support determine the number of ecological farms. The industrial foundation affects the scale of ecological farms in China, while the level of science and technology eliminates the restrictions of other factors to a certain extent. This study provides a reference for optimizing the spatial distribution pattern of ecological farms in China and promoting ecological agriculture. In addition, it presents a viable approach to safeguarding food security. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The low-carbon development of China's iron and steel industry (ISI) is important but challenging work for the attainment of China's carbon neutrality by 2060. However, most previous studies related to the low-carbon development of China's ISI are fragmented from different views such as production-side mitigation, demand-side mitigation, or mitigation technologies. Additionally, there is still a lack of a comprehensive overview of the long-term pathway to the low-carbon development of China's ISI. To respond to this gap and to contribute to better guide policymaking in China, this paper conducted a timely and comprehensive review following the technology roadmap framework covering the status quo, future vision, and key actions of the low-carbon development of the world and China's ISI. First, this paper provides an overview of the technology roadmap of low-carbon development around the main steel production countries in the world. Second, the potential for key decarbonization actions available for China's ISI are evaluated in detail. Third, policy and research recommendations are put forward for the future low-carbon development of China's ISI. Through this comprehensive review, four key actions can be applied to the low-carbon development of China's ISI: improving energy efficiency, shifting to Scrap/EAF route, promoting material efficiency strategy, and deploying radical innovation technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analysis of the change of overall energy efficiency performance of an energy system is a fundamental work for the energy-saving policymaking. However, previous studies seldom focus on energy stages from useful energy to final service, while most attention are paid on stages from energy source to useful energy. In this paper, we develop a high-resolution the Societal Exergy Analysis and Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index (SEA-LMDI) method to analysis changes and driving factors of the aggregate exergy efficiency, in which the boundary of the SEA is extended to passive systems and final services, and a LMDI decomposition method is developed to quantify contributions of efficiency factors and structure factors of all six stages on the aggregate exergy efficiency. A case study of China during 2005–2015 reveals that: (a) the aggregate exergy efficiency from energy source to final service is only from 3.7% to 4.8% during 2005–2015, showing a huge theoretical potential of efficiency improvement. (b) Large passive losses are identified in passive systems and nearly 2/3 of useful energy can be theoretically saved by improving passive systems. (c) Deep analysis of industrial coal-fired boilers indicates that the internal structural adjustments are also important for the aggregate improvement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]