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Urban metabolic efficiencies and elasticities of Chinese cities

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Abstract

Urban metabolism is a complex system of materials, energy, population and environment, which usually can be measured by the Emergy Synthesis (ES) and the Slacks-Based Measure (SBM) approach. In this paper, by employing the two approaches of ES and SBM, as well as metabolic evolution index, urban metabolic stocks, efficiencies and elasticity of 31 Chinese cities are evaluated in a systematic way. The results imply that over the last decade (2000–2010), most of the cities, such as Chongqing, Nanjing, Shijiazhuang, Hangzhou, were experiencing drastic urban metabolic efficiency decline accompanied with a moderate decrease of industrial outputs. By contrast, metropolises and specialized cities have improved their urban metabolic performances, with higher output-input ratio and fewer undesirable outputs. However, their exported emergy experienced a substantial increase as well. It is concluded that local urban management might develop policies to diversify urban renewable supplies and address the undesirable output problems. The urban emergy of renewable resources should be specified as a prime focus for future research. In addition, mechanisms of different urban metabolic models will also be necessary for researchers.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China

    Tao Song, Jianming Cai, Zhenshan Yang, Mingxing Chen & Jing Lin

  2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China

    Jing Lin

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  1. Tao Song
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Correspondence to Zhenshan Yang.

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Foundation item: Under the auspices of National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41530634, 41530751), Key Consulting Project of the Chinese Academy of Science and Technology Strategic Consulting (No.Y02015001), Open Project Funding of Beijing Modern Industrial New Area Development Research Base in 2015 (No. JD2015002), Youth Innovation Promotion Association of Chinese Academy of Sciences (No. 2014042)

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Song, T., Cai, J., Yang, Z. et al. Urban metabolic efficiencies and elasticities of Chinese cities. Chin. Geogr. Sci. 26, 715–730 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11769-016-0830-1

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