College of Economy and Trade, Hunan University, Changsha, 410082, People's Republic of China.
College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Hunan University, Changsha, 410082, People's Republic of China.
Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2022 Mar;29(15):21876-21890. doi: 10.1007/s11356-021-17405-6. Epub 2021 Nov 13.
Under the goal of carbon neutralization, the prevention and control of pollution emissions are very meaningful. Different levels of urban economic development correspond to different pollutant discharges. An assessment of pollution inequality among cities can quantitatively explain regional differences in pollution treatment. This paper proposes a new paradigm to measure pollution inequality within the Yangtze River Delta Economic Zone of China and aims to compare the inequality of pollutant discharge of urban agglomerations and nonurban agglomerations from 2001 to 2017. The findings reveal that the overall pollutant discharge shows a slight upward trend and gradually changes from a "two polarization" distribution in 2001 to a "centralized" distribution in 2017. However, the inequality of pollutant discharge declines during this period, whereby the pattern of the within-group inequality component is similar to the overall inequality, while the inequality of nonurban agglomeration pollution is more severe than that of urban agglomeration pollution. Further decomposition indicates that the difference in pollution intensity is the most critical factor leading to the inequality of pollution discharge, and reducing the gap in energy intensity is the most rapid way to reduce the inequality of pollution discharge. To measure the total driving force that leads to their inequality and to predict the degree of inequality of pollutant discharge, we use a new Theil-DEA model. Based on the empirical results, we anticipate that the imbalance of pollutant discharge will either temporarily maintain the status quo or worsen. Finally, we briefly discuss policy recommendations and special issues.
在碳中和目标下，防治污染排放意义重大。不同层次的城市经济发展对应着不同的污染物排放。对城市污染不平等的评估可以定量解释污染治理的区域差异。本文提出了一种新的测度中国长江三角洲经济区内部污染不平等的范式，旨在比较 2001 年至 2017 年城市群和非城市群的污染物排放不平等。研究结果表明，总体污染物排放呈轻微上升趋势，并逐渐从 2001 年的“两极化”分布转变为 2017 年的“集中化”分布。然而，在此期间，污染物排放的不平等程度有所下降，其中组内不平等成分的模式与总体不平等相似，而非城市群的污染不平等比城市群更为严重。进一步的分解表明，污染强度的差异是导致污染排放不平等的最关键因素，而降低能源强度的差距是降低污染排放不平等的最快捷方式。为了衡量导致其不平等的总驱动力，并预测污染物排放不平等的程度，我们使用了一种新的 Theil-DEA 模型。基于实证结果，我们预计污染物排放的不平衡将暂时保持现状或恶化。最后，我们简要讨论了政策建议和特殊问题。
