Journal Home Online First Current Issue Archive For Authors Journal Information 中文版

Frontiers of Environmental Science & Engineering >> 2013, Volume 7, Issue 1 doi: 10.1007/s11783-012-0402-2

Clustering economic sectors in China on a life cycle basis to achieve environmental sustainability

1. School of Environment, State Key Joint Laboratory of Environment Simulation and Pollution Control, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China; 2. School of Environment and Safety Engineering, Qingdao University of Science & Technology, Qingdao 266042, China

Available online: 2013-02-01

Next Previous

Abstract

To improve material efficiency, industrial structure optimization becomes a focal point in Chinese industrial and environmental policies. It is crucial to cluster economic sectors and determine their priority for industrial and environmental policy implementation. Integrating a set of criteria, a hybrid input-output model and the hierarchical cluster analysis, this study clusters China’s economic sectors and determines their priority on a life cycle basis. China’s economic sectors are clustered into three clusters. Industrial structure changes (industrial policy) should encourage the development of sectors in cluster 1 and limit the development of sectors in cluster 2. Technology development and materials recycling (two environmental policies) should mainly focus on sectors in clusters 1 and 2. Future industrial policies in China should limit the development of two sectors named and . Instead of limiting some industries by command-and-control, the best policy option is to remedy environmental standards and law enforcement. Enterprises belonging to the identified key sectors from the viewpoint of direct production impacts should be concerned to achieve enterprise sustainability. To achieve sustainable production chains, the identified key sectors from the viewpoint of accumulative production impacts should be concerned. For sustainable consumption, the identified key sectors from the viewpoint of consumption impacts should be concerned to transform consumption styles. Most of environmental pressure can be alleviated not only by technical improvements and material recycling, but also by the development of economic sectors in cluster 1.

Related Research