Review on Urban GHG Inventory in China

Abstract

With the rapid urbanization progress of China, a study on an urban GHG inventory is of great significance. However, related studies in China are still in the exploratory stage. This paper firstly introduces three major urban GHG inventory accounting methods and related issues with regard to Chinese cities, and then reviews the published studies of urban GHG inventories in China in the past few years. Methodology frameworks, gas types, emission scopes, geographical boundaries are examined and compared. With great distinctions in the accounting methods and contents, there is no direct comparability between the research results. However, the following characteristics can still be found: the GHG emissions per capita and GHG emissions per unit of GDP are higher than the world average level, and the total GHG emissions maintains an increasing trend, although the GHG emissions per unit of GDP keeps declining. Currently, researches on the urban GHG inventory in China are mainly based on the non-urban-level IPCC Guidelines and Provincial-level guidelines. The release of urban-level GHG inventory estimation guidelines in China is expected to provide unified standards for related studies in the future.