Simulations for double dividend of carbon tax and improved energy efficiency in the transportation industry.

The Chinese visional goal of achieving the "carbon peak" and "carbon neutrality" puts forward higher requirements for low-carbon development in the transportation industry. Seeking appropriate mitigation strategies to develop low-carbon transportation has been an important part of low-carbon economic development. This study develops a CGE model to analyze the impact of carbon-tax implementation on the transportation industry. It designs four carbon tax-recycling scenarios and simulates for double dividend of carbon tax policy. Then, it designs three scenarios including improved energy efficiency and a carbon tax to explore appropriate mitigation strategies combination. The carbon tax will reduce carbon emissions but it will also reduce sectoral outputs. However, carbon tax recycling can alleviate the negative impact on sectoral outputs, meanwhile achieving reducing carbon emissions. The energy rebound effect brought by improved energy efficiency will greatly reduce the carbon emissions reduction effect, but the carbon tax can promote the awareness of emission reduction of consumers and inhibit the energy rebound effect in the transportation industry. Therefore, at the same time of improved energy efficiency, carbon tax policies should be timely formulated to better promote the sustainable development of the varied transport sectors.

Prefabrication decisions of the construction supply chain under government subsidies.

Prefabrication has been generating increasing interest as a cleaner production strategy to promote sustainable development. Alongside this trend, various subsidies have been set to improve prefabrication levels. This paper evaluates the prefabrication levels of buildings through the assembly rate. A series of models are established to investigate the optimal assembly rate under various government subsidies. The optimal assembly rate and subsidy revenue-sharing coefficient are analyzed in both decentralized and centralized scenarios. By comparing the optimal decisions in these two scenarios, a transfer payment contract is proposed that enables the overall coordination of the prefabricated construction supply chain (PCSC). The results show that the optimal assembly rate in the centralized scenario is higher than that in the decentralized one. When the revenue-sharing coefficient is 100%, the subsidy revenue-sharing contract can coordinate the PCSC system and realize the Pareto improvement. When certain conditions are satisfied in the transfer payment contract, business profits can achieve Pareto optimality. This research provides a reference for construction enterprises making decisions to promote the development of PCSC.

Evolutionary Games of Low-Carbon Behaviors of Construction Stakeholders under Carbon Taxes.

The development of low-carbon buildings (LCBs) in China has not reached its expected status, although the Chinese government has formulated many relevant regulations. The real estate developers and consumers are essential participants in the development of LCBs. This paper explores whether the government's implementation of the carbon tax will change their choices of LCBs. Evolutionary game models between developers and consumers are established under static and dynamic carbon taxes. Their evolutionarily stable strategies (ESS) are deduced in different situations. According to the real scenarios in China, numerical simulations are further conducted to show that carbon tax influences the low-carbon behaviors of stakeholders in the construction industry. Under a static carbon tax, the two players cannot reach an equilibrium state, while the game system is stable under a dynamic tax. The probability of the developers constructing LCBs is positively related to the carbon tax, while its degree is gradually weakened as the tax rate increases. Therefore, an appropriate tax should be set to promote the development of LCBs effectively. Finally, policy implications are put forwarded to guide the participants' low-carbon behaviors and reduce the carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry.

CO2 flows in the inter-regional and inter-sectoral network of the Yangtze River Economic Zone.

As a significant economic region in China, the Yangtze River Economic Zone has close spatial and sectoral linkages and generates considerable CO2 emissions. Reducing CO2 emissions in the Yangtze River Economic Zone (YREZ) while considering both inter-regional and inter-sectoral connections has become an essential issue. Based on a multi-regional input-output model and complex network theory, this study constructed a network with inter-regional and inter-sectoral CO2 emission flows in the YREZ simultaneously to reveal sectoral and spatial transfer pattern and identify the key sectors at the provincial level. The results of density, connectedness, hierarchy, and efficiency showed that the CO2 flow network was vulnerable and sensitive. The key provincial sectors were identified through different network indicators, including degree centrality, betweenness centrality, and eigenvector centrality. According to their characteristics, the 66 sectors were categorized into different communities with the roles of suppliers, receivers, and intermediaries. The findings of this study provided an integral map of CO2 emission flows in the YREZ so that the specific and comprehensive policies could be designed from sectoral and provincial level to avoid the offset of different policies.

An Environmental Management Maturity Model of Construction Programs Using the AHP-Entropy Approach.

The accelerating process of urbanization in China has led to considerable opportunities for the development of construction projects, however, environmental issues have become an important constraint on the implementation of these projects. To quantitatively describe the environmental management capabilities of such projects, this paper proposes a 2-dimensional Environmental Management Maturity Model of Construction Program (EMMMCP) based on an analysis of existing projects, group management theory and a management maturity model. In this model, a synergetic process was included to compensate for the lack of consideration of synergies in previous studies, and it was involved in the construction of the first dimension, i.e., the environmental management index system. The second dimension, i.e., the maturity level of environment management, was then constructed by redefining the hierarchical characteristics of construction program (CP) environmental management maturity. Additionally, a mathematical solution to this proposed model was derived via the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP)-entropy approach. To verify the effectiveness and feasibility of this proposed model, a computational experiment was conducted, and the results show that this approach could not only measure the individual levels of different processes, but also achieve the most important objective of providing a reference for stakeholders when making decisions on the environmental management of construction program, which reflects this model is reasonable for evaluating the level of environmental management maturity in CP. To our knowledge, this paper is the first study to evaluate the environmental management maturity levels of CP, which would fill the gap between project program management and environmental management and provide a reference for relevant management personnel to enhance their environmental management capabilities.