Energy and environment in Chinese rural buildings: Situations, challenges, and intervention strategies

•We conducted a national survey of energy and environment in China's rural housing.•We analyzed the situation and features and addressed the problems and challenges.•We proposed and implemented intervention strategies called “zero coal villages”.

A large-scale national survey of energy consumption and indoor environmental quality of rural housing was conducted in China. Its purpose was to obtain fundamental data and to analyze key problems related to the homes of approximately 600 million rural people. The survey results indicate that the total annual household energy consumption in rural China reached 317 million tons of standard coal equivalent (tce) (9.3 × 109 GJ), in the forms of 192 million tons of raw coal (4.0 × 109 GJ), 5.9 million tons of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) (0.3 × 109 MJ), 132 billion kWh of electricity (1.4 × 109 GJ), and 219 million tons of raw biomass (3.6 × 109 GJ). There is an upward trend in the use of coal for space heating and cooking, which is a significant source of air pollution. The pilot study of a program to provide passive energy savings in northern rural China was also conducted. Based on the results of actual demonstration projects, feasible intervention strategies for sustainable development in rural China are proposed, with the goal of achieving “zero coal villages”. Projections show that achieving “zero coal villages” nationwide could provide huge and permanent benefits both to China and to the rest of the world. The results obtained from this study could also provide guidance for development of rural housing in other countries, particularly in the developing world.