CO2 emissions and urbanization correlation in China based on threshold analysis

Urbanization and CO2 emissions trends are driven by worldwide economic development. Studies indicate a direct correlation between urbanization and CO2 emissions increases with both stimulating and inhibiting factors exhibited in the urbanization process and with periodic and regional characteristics exhibited with CO2 emission. The relationship between urbanization and CO2 emissions specifically in China from 1979 to 2013 is researched in this paper The novel points of this paper lies in utilizing a threshold mode to test periodic characteristics and analysis by regions. Results verify the effect of urbanization on CO2 emissions as: (1) emissions increase when threshold point 0.43 was surpassed; (2) emissions increase as residential income increases; (3) coefficients of urbanization on emissions increase initially and then decrease as a factor of increasing industry percentage in overall GDP; (4) patterns of threshold points vary geographically.