Comparative study on the influence of final use structure on carbon emissions in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region

The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region's rapid economic development has led to a dramatic increase in its CO₂ emissions, which is closely related to various regions' consumption habits and structures. In this paper, the decomposition analysis method based on input and output (IO-SDA) was applied to decompose the CO₂ emissions change of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region from 1997 to 2012 into five driving factors: population, carbon emission efficiency, production structure, final use structure and per capita regional GDP, and then the final use structure factor was further analyzed. The results show that: (1) the population and per capita regional GDP promote the CO₂ emissions of all regions; Carbon emission efficiency is the biggest offsetting factor; The effect of final use structure changes on the growth of CO₂ emissions in Beijing and Hebei remains unchanged. The effect on Tianjin was from 0.7Mt offset to 0.8Mt promotion. (2) Urban household consumption is the most important factor offsetting CO₂ emissions in Beijing. Investment and export are the most important final use types for promoting the growth of CO₂ emissions in Tianjin and Hebei, with the contribution of 95.78% and 88.09%, respectively. (3) From the sectoral perspective: The construction sector has the greatest impact on the total capital formation of the three regions. In terms of exports, Beijing's tertiary industry has the largest offsetting effect, while Tianjin and Hebei mainly rely on the promotion of metal smelting and other manufacturing industries. Finally, some policy implications for low carbonization are proposed in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region.