The CO2 Reduction Effects and Climate Benefit of Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics Green Practice

Currently, China faces both the challenge of mitigating the CO2 emissions in coping with global climate change and abating air pollutants emissions in dealing with domestic environmental stresses. Although there being on-going discussions, it is still not clear for China that how to integrate greenhouse gas abatement into air pollution control policy framework now. In this study, we try to estimate CO2 reduction by major greening Olympic measures for 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, aiming to provide evidence on curbing CO2 emissions as a co-benefit for improving local air quality by mega-events. CO2 emission reduction by three types of measures has been estimated including: energy related measures, transport management, and temporary air pollution control measures. As estimated, from the perspective of long-term effect, the measure of clean energy substitution and improving energy efficiency and application of advance energy saving technologies would be cost -effectiveness measures for China addressing both air pollution control and green-house gases abatement. We suggest China government integrate CO2 reduction to local air quality improvement policy framework, and take mega-events as triggers for more sustainable urbandevelopment.