Several novel indicators being applied to analyze the relationships between Chinese economic growth, energy consumption and its impact of emissions

The sustainability of Chinese economy has attracted attentions from all over the world since China's reform & opening up policy. This paper attempted to evaluate the relationships among Chinese economy, energy and its impact of emissions during 1991–2009 using several novel indicators based on emergy, energy and monetary units. The results show that NH3-N in wastewater has taken main responsibility for impact of emissions, the hidden environmental cost per unit economic output has been continuously reduced, education and R & D investment has cut pollutants generating intensity since 1997, and environmental protection investment has cut emission intensity since 1996. Generally speaking, the coordination degree of structure and scale of China's economy has been improved to different degree from 1991 to 2009. However, the growth of education and R & D investment and environmental protection investment has not prevented impact of emissions from increase caused by economic aggregate growth, and the turning point has not appeared in this period. Finally, this paper discusses some related issues and puts forward the corresponding suggestions.

► We studied the relationships among China's economy, energy and emissions’ impact.
► The relationships among these issues have been improved to different degrees.
► However, China's economy is far from sustainable development.