School of Economics, Shanghai University, Shanghai, 200444, China; Energy Center, The University of Auckland, Auckland, 1010, New Zealand.
Energy Center, The University of Auckland, Auckland, 1010, New Zealand.
J Environ Manage. 2023 Nov 1;345:118692. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2023.118692. Epub 2023 Jul 29.
Volatile organic compounds (VOC) contributing to smog formation, have been an important indicator of atmospheric governance during China's "14th Five-Year Plan". VOC would be possibly incorporated into the scope of environmental protection tax, but previous studies have seldom explored impacts of VOC control policies at national and regional levels. Here, we design a national uniform VOC control policy, as well as two regionally differentiated policies based on regional disparities in PM concentrations and energy intensity by using a cross-scale dynamic computable general equilibrium (CGE) model. Our analysis is to assess the impacts of these policies on VOC, CO, sulfur dioxide (SO), nitrogen oxides (NO), and PM emissions, air quality and environmental equity, and to estimate health benefits, policy costs and net benefits. We find that national and regionally differentiated VOC control policies generally lead to VOC emission reductions and generate co-benefits on emission reductions in CO, SO, NO and PM at national and provincial levels. However, regional emission leakage exists due to differences in the provincial costs of VOC mitigation. The regionally differentiated VOC pricing policies are found to be more effective to enhance environmental equity than the uniform policy. In particular, the regionally differentiated VOC control policy based on provincial energy efficiency is found to be superior to other policies in terms of improve air quality. Furthermore, the human health benefits associated with VOC pricing policies would partially offset policy costs at both the national and regional levels. Our results suggest that policymakers would pay attention to developing regions with low energy efficiency which have the great emission reduction potential. Advanced producing technology and further end-of-pipe control measures to reduce non-combustion PM emissions are needed. VOC policy designed based on provincial energy efficiency provides great insights for environmental policy making to accomplish 2035 goal of building a Beautiful China.
挥发性有机化合物（VOC）是导致雾霾形成的主要因素，也是中国“十四五”期间大气治理的重要指标。VOC 可能会被纳入环境保护税的征收范围，但之前的研究很少探讨国家和地区层面 VOC 控制政策的影响。在这里，我们采用跨尺度动态可计算一般均衡（CGE）模型，设计了一项全国统一的 VOC 控制政策，以及两项基于 PM 浓度和能源强度区域差异的区域性差异化政策。我们的分析旨在评估这些政策对 VOC、CO、二氧化硫（SO）、氮氧化物（NO）和 PM 排放、空气质量和环境公平的影响，并估算健康效益、政策成本和净效益。我们发现，全国和区域性差异化 VOC 控制政策通常会导致 VOC 排放量减少，并在国家和省级层面上带来 CO、SO、NO 和 PM 减排的协同效益。然而，由于省级 VOC 减排成本的差异，存在区域排放泄漏。与统一政策相比，区域性差异化 VOC 定价政策在增强环境公平方面更为有效。特别是，基于省级能源效率的区域性差异化 VOC 控制政策在改善空气质量方面优于其他政策。此外，与 VOC 定价政策相关的人类健康效益将在国家和地区层面部分抵消政策成本。我们的研究结果表明，政策制定者应关注能源效率较低的欠发达地区，这些地区具有巨大的减排潜力。需要先进的生产技术和进一步的末端治理措施来减少非燃烧 PM 排放。基于省级能源效率的 VOC 政策为实现 2035 年美丽中国建设目标的环境政策制定提供了重要的思路。
