Low-carbon City and New-type Urbanization

Urban development is a key factor of urban climate issues. And the quality of urban development is largely determined by urban planning approaches. Based on modern quality management theory, by means of expert interview and questionnaire survey, basic information and key issues of urban planning approaches in Xiamen, which are followed by optimization proposal, are collected and analyzed from aspects of process, procedure, and organization structure, from the perspective of integrating urban climate problem-solving and urban planning.

This paper explores the optimization of a combined heat and power generation system (CCHP) with ice thermal storage air-conditioning system in consideration of minimal cost. A CCHP requires the simultaneity of the electrical and thermal demands. However, the thermal demand is strongly time-varying or even discontinuous. The ice thermal storage provides an attractive solution to the CCHP by shifting the electrical power while more profitably exploiting the thermal energy. The optimization of the simultaneous use of a gas turbine, an absorption chiller, a brine chiller, and an ice-storage tank to satisfy given electricity, heat, and cooling demands is considered. An MINLP algorithm is used to develop optimal operating strategies for the cogeneration system. Case study is based on a building belonging to Shanghai Advanced Research Institute. Finally, the results of economic analysis providing some guidelines of operation strategies to a CCHP with ice thermal storage.

This paper calculated the energy-related carbon emissions from production, household and energy transformation sectors in Shanghai and decomposed the effects of their changes in carbon emissions resulting from 11 causal factors of reflecting the changes in socioeconomic activity, intensity of energy and the structure by logarithmic mean divisia index. The results show that the changes of economic activity (EA), population size (PS), total energy consumption in transformation and energy consumption per capita (ECPC) increase CO

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emissions obviously. The changes of energy intensity (EI), urban and rural population distribution structure, energy mix of household and mix of energy in transformation drive the decrease of CO

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emissions. The changes of economic structure (ES), energy mix of production, and energy transformation structure (ETS) can’t increase or decreased CO

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emissions continuously in 3 periods respectively. Therefore, adjusting ES, ETS, energy mix of transformation and decreasing the EI of each production sector will be the main routes to reduce CO

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emissions. Developing clean energy to substitute fossil energy and enforcement of carbon capture will be necessary in the future.

This study constructed a real option valuation model that the risk could be adjustable based on the characteristics of renewable energy projects and the idea of the Capital Asset Pricing Model and used this model to valuate the renewable energy projects considering selling green electricity certificate revenue. And then, it verified the effectiveness and rationality of this model through the investment projects of the wind power.

Problems and limitations of existing multi-connected air-conditioning unit standards are analyzed in this chapter. Based on irrationality of the existing evaluation criteria, the evaluation index and method for evaluating whole year energy consumption and efficiency of multi-connected air-conditioning system are studied. The evaluation index, calculation formula, weights, and testing condition parameters are proposed. The correctness of the evaluation method is verified. The results show that eight region average classification method based on dynamic load is feasible to evaluate seasonal energy efficiency ratio of multi-connected air-conditioning system. The evaluation method is applicable to evaluate DVM or variable frequency-controlled multi-connected air-conditioning system. The evaluation method can be applied to evaluate annual energy consumption and annual integrated energy use efficiency of multi-connected air-conditioning system in the building, as well as to compare energy efficiency among different air-conditioning systems.

Creating a transit-oriented built environment and implementing the important economic policy of transport subsidy are effective means to promote the use and accelerate the development of public transit. The importance of the transport economic policy must not be ignored because a policy preference will possibly affect travel behavior to a great extent. Taking subsidy as an angle and the city Nanjing as an example, this article focused on analyzing and comparing the operating subsidy and disguised external cost subsidy for public transit and cars use. The result showed that the unit subsidy for cars is 11.8 times of that for public transit. This is extremely unfair and it goes against the established transit-oriented development direction. Furthermore, this article, based on stated preference survey data, analyzed the transfer of travel mode on the condition that free parking is cancelled. The result showed that more than 1/3 customers would turn to public transit and slow-moving traffic under that condition. In conclusion, this article brought forward policy suggestions, such as eliminating the subsidy for parking prices, setting maximum index of appertaining parking facilities instead of minimum index, subsidizing public transit, and increasing car-using tax, in order to achieve society equity and transit-oriented development.

The aim of this paper is to analyze the supporting industry of urbanization in Xinjiang, with particular reference to low-carbon city development, and to choose eco-friendly industry which gradually transits to low-carbon urbanization. Industrial development and urbanization are two important aspects in the process of regional economic development, they promote each other, restrict each other. The precondition of realizing urbanization, which is based on the industrial development and support, the development of the new type of urbanization, is more based on the industry with support role. Using WT model to choose new-type urbanization supporting industry in Xinjiang, we choose 15 supporting industries among environment-oriented perspective, employment-oriented perspective, and tax-oriented perspective, respectively. The paper concludes that a move toward low-carbon urbanization is contingent on changing supporting industry with evolving regional industry for urban development and regeneration.

At present, energy saving and emission reduction have become a central task for all countries and governments, and green building has become a research hot spot at the same time. Green building is the building which maximizes the conservation of resources, protection of the environment, and realization of coordinated unification between human and nature in the whole life cycle of the building. Green building is an important embodiment of sustainable development strategy. At the beginning of the 1990s, the concept of green building was introduced to China. In recent years, in order to promote the development of green building, China issued a series of related approaches and normative documents, such as Evaluation Standard for Green Building (GB/T50378-2006). Recently, in order to improve the green building standard, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Construction gives out the announcement, approving the Evaluation Standard for Green Building as the national standard, numbered GB/T50378-2014. The US Green Building Rating System (LEED) is now considered to be the most sophisticated and influential among all kinds of environmental protection assessments. In the revision of the Evaluation Standard for Green Building, certain aspects of LEED were consulted, so there is similarity between the two standards. But Evaluation Standard for Green Building also has its own characteristics based on China’s conditions. So this chapter pays attention to the comparison of the Evaluation Standard for Green Building (the latest revision), Evaluation Standard for Green Building (GB/T50378-2006), and US LEED standards. It uses the following eight aspects: evaluation phase, evaluation objects, index categories, refined indicators, scoring points, evaluation methods, evaluation results, and weight distribution to show the similarities and differences among the three standards. And it can point out the advantages and shortcomings of Evaluation Standard for Green Building in China and makes reasonable suggestions.

A study gives rise to a new angle of the on-site detection method for the classic audible noise due to corona discharge. Based on a fundamental acoustic model, which describes major acoustic characters of the N-type wave with the consideration of the gradual distortion of the propagating sound wave, difference of Gaussians method combined with frequency comb filter is adopted for detecting corona discharge noise. The preliminary test is given to confirm the effectivity of the proposed method in more practical conditions. The research work may be helpful to the construction of new power transmission grid in China.

This paper begins from the discussion on the definition of urban wetland and then depicts the current situation and problems associated specifically with Chinese urban wetlands. The case study of the Dianchi Lake wetland is introduced to illustrate a successful example of Chinese systematic urban wetland conservation and development. From wetland plants guidance and water quality controls, increasing the self-purifying ability to construction guidance and controls, the paper provides a comprehensive process of urban wetland management. From the case study, this paper discusses the successful experience of wetland conservation and development as well, providing a strong guideline for corresponding cases across China and the world.

At present, new energy and environmental protection as the theme of “low-carbon economy” are becoming the world’s economic development objectives; the relationship between trade and environment has become increasingly close. China’s textile and garment industry is one of the most polluting industries, and the environmental problems will become an important issue to the whole industry. This chapter aimed to discover the current environmental issues in textile and garment trade, in order to optimize the development of textile and garment industry and find solutions to these problems. This chapter mainly discussed four issues that were environmental pollution, green barriers, environmental labeling system, and low carbon.

To deal with global warming and maintain the harmonious relationship between people and the nature, low-carbon city and transportation have become the important strategies of sustainable development. Carsharing is a new means of transportation in China, and some research has indicated that it holds considerable benefits to both society and environment. In recent years, electric vehicle (EV) has become the trend of automotive industry and some EV carsharing programs have been launched; therefore, it is necessary to study their greenhouse gas (GHG) emission impacts on cities. By comparing traditional carsharing with EV carsharing, the authors analyze the households’ travel behaviors before and after participating in EV carsharing, which are described by 12 travel behavior parameters. Adding three energy consumption parameters and three emission parameters, the authors propose a calculation model for the GHG emission impacts of EV carsharing. The impacts on low-carbon cities and transportation can be assessed based on this model after acquiring specific data of those parameters by conducting questionnaire surveys, recording with instruments, or referring to research papers.

The urbanization of Guangxi starts late, and it has developed rapidly, but in the process of urbanization, industrial and energy structure is irrational, resulting in the growing problem of cities and towns pollution. So changing the traditional development model of urbanization, implementing low-carbon development path is necessary. Based on the status research of Guangxi urbanization, this article analyzes the main features of urbanization in Guangxi, finding the problems of increasing environmental pollution, the construction of environmental protection facilities lag, lack of green assessment system, and other issues caused by the irrational industrial structure. This article puts forward four low-carbon development proposals: first, establishing a green GDP examination and evaluation system, strengthening supervision and restraint effect; second, adjusting industrial layout, enhancing the level of industrial development; third, improving the environmental management system, and strengthening environmental infrastructure; and fourth, using low-carbon development and sustainable development as guidance, carrying out scientific urban planning. The purpose is to promote the healthy development of urbanization in Guangxi and explore a new and sustainable, low-carbon development-oriented urbanization road.

On the basis of comprehensive analysis of traffic safety evaluation studies abroad, this paper presented the evaluation index system composed of four areas, such as people, traffic flow characteristics, traffic environment, and traffic management, consisting of a total of 15 indexes for special situation and problems in port road traffic safety. Each index has definite index classification criteria, evaluation requirements, and investigation methods. This paper also built evaluation model based on BP neural network and analyzed its calculation method in detail. This method has a guiding role for the management and decision levels of the port road traffic management department.

Guangxi’s economic development mainly relies on major industries such as electric power, steel, cement, nonferrous metallurgy, papermaking, sugar, starch, and glass industry. With continuous development of the economy, the situation of carbon emission reduction of these industries is not optimistic. In this paper, carbon emission of Guangxi’s major industries in 2012 was calculated using Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) method, and then, the situation of carbon emissions was analyzed. The results showed that carbon emission of Guangxi’s major industries mainly came from energy consumption, but carbon emissions in the technological process also should not be ignored; carbon emissions were mainly from industries such as steel, cement, thermal power, and nonferrous metallurgical and chemical industry where energy consumption is high and energy efficiency is low. The key factors that influence carbon emissions of these industries included irrational energy consumption structure and energy processing, the overall low utilization efficiency, and the increasing demand with the rapid economic growth. In order to realize a low-carbon economy and sustainable development in these major industries, the following measures were proposed such as formulation of low-carbon development planning and regulatory standards in these industries, management strengthening of the energy consumption in existing enterprises, optimization of the industrial and energy structure, and actively carrying out industrial upgrade, vigorous promotion of the use of new energy, establishment of the financing and policy guaranteeing system, and improvement of the processing and utilization of energy resources.

The main objective of this research is to explore the influence of activities of a seaport on the carbon pollution of the surrounding city and suggest the adequate measures for its reduction. This paper focuses on the land-side area of the seaport by considering three kinds of emissions sources: cargo handling equipment, heavy-duty vehicles, and locomotives, as they pollute the seaport land-side area and are included into the transport infrastructure of the city. The multiple methodologies were used in this research to confirm the environmental effectiveness, including the total frame of three approaches, the multiple case study to choose suitable evaluation methods, case study for verification of the proposed method, and the quantitative method to calculate the emission and inventories. A case study was carried out on the influence of the operations of Qingdao Port on Qingdao city. As a result, some measures of emission reduction are proposed for Qingdao Port to decrease CO

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produced by CHE, HDV, and RL through improving operation, such as using clean fuels, controlling emissions, encouraging the choice of the rail transportation, and developing dry ports.

In the discipline of urban design application, the Gestalt principle implied in the traditional visual analysis pathway is a microscopic description of the interaction between the visual subject and object. The theory of complex adaptive system is generally a macroscopic description of the interaction between the visual subject and object. Gestalt principle in the microscopic sense, when integrated into the complex scientific viewpoint, can effectively characterize the evolution of urban visual elements and therefore enhance the performance of its functions. The focus points of this article are as follows: (1) The consistency between Gestalt principle and the integration principle in city as a complex system was reviewed. (2) By investigating the visual features of the city in various periods, the depth and width of the application of Gestalt principle of vision over time was discussed. (3) A systematic review of the existing tools for visual analysis was given. The integrated organization role and the self-similarity rule based on Gestalt principle were extracted. (4) A possibility of constructing a comprehensive tool for vision adaptability analysis was predicted from the perspective of complex system.

Due to energy shortage and air pollution, the distributed energy supply system has been quickly developed. Because it can improve the effectiveness of natural gas utilization and save energy and reduce emission. The core equipment of the distributed energy supply system is the gas turbine which is rated up to 2 MWs in China. So a recuperated cycle gas turbine was presented in this paper. Three types of recuperator such as the tabular, plate fin, and primary surface recuperators were designed and analyzed. The result shows that the primary surface recuperator has more advantages than the other two. It has higher compactness and less weight. If the whole manufacture process is well developed the primary surface recuperator will have more competitiveness in the future recuperator market. What is more, the increasing of the effectiveness of the recuperator will result in a dramatic increase in the recuperator size and weight. So when a recuperator is designed it must be taken into consideration as an integrate part of the overall energy conversion system.

After green building initiative, much more attention has been paid to green campus transformation. Green campus serves as a pilot site for low-carbon city. This paper summarized the development process of green campus while analyzed the current situation of China’s green campus initiative, including overemphasis on energy efficiency of single building, lack of integrated campus efficiency monitoring system, and insufficient financial support. Based on the experiences and enlightenment from Cornell University’s Climate Action Plan, the sustainable development of green campus in China has been discussed, in the aspects of single building, community/campus, and city. On building level, campus building energy technology demonstration should be strengthened and popularized. On community/campus level, regulatory agencies should be established to take charge of low-carbon campus overall planning and monitoring. On city level, campus, as a regional experimental field of sustainable development, should promote low-carbon transformation of the city in specific ways.

City is the important carrier for creating material wealth. However, it is the major consumer of energy and major emitters of greenhouse gases. So low-carbon cities and ecological civilization have become the strategic choices for sustainable development in our economic society. Starting from the concept of low-carbon city, this text uses SWOT model to analyze the low-carbon city and puts forward the new path for the low-carbon city construction with Chinese characteristics.

There are three energy modes in Shanghai Advanced Research Institute-CAS: power production systems (solar power, wind power, combined cooling, heating and power, solid oxide fuel cell), power storage systems, and power consumption unit (electric vehicles, laboratory equipment, computer room, canteen, elevators, air conditioning systems, etc.). Power forecast for production and consumption accurately can improve operational safety and efficiency of power networks and equipment and reducing gas and electricity consumption, is a foundation for power production and storage, and used to optimize scheduling decisions and to ensure the safety of energy systems and economic and rational operation. Solution in the park combined energy production, storage, and consumption of the entire supply chain. Power production and consumption forecast system architecture, functional division, predicted core processes, and other aspects are given in regional power production and consumption forecast solutions. It has integrated into the energy management system in the Shanghai Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park in Pudong through demonstration and application, verifying its effectiveness.

In order to improve the performance of electric vehicle, some battery life tests have been carried out to acquire the relevant conclusions about battery internal resistance during charging and discharging and establish the resistance equivalent model for the real-time identification, all of which above are set up as the evaluation index of state of charge (SOC). The results demonstrated that internal resistance can reduce the inaccuracies of SOC estimation and car mileage.

As one of the most energy-efficient mass transit systems, metro railway has increasingly make use of modern wireless communication technologies to improve the efficiency and safety. In this chapter, we discuss some acoustic distance measurement and proximity detection methods, which may be integrated into an intelligent onboard proximity warning and collision avoidance system in order to increase the metro operation efficiency by safely improving the headways when the automatic train control (ATC) system is switched into a degraded mode. Those acoustic methods are based on the reception, processing, and identification of acoustic signals that are either excited by the moving vehicles or artificially generated by loudspeakers. Example system is introduced and partially validated by online tests. It is shown that the acoustic methods, when implemented independent of the railway signal and communication systems, have potential to improve the transit efficiency and safety without any wayside equipment.

China’s urban conditions are facing dire challenges due to the incremental development paces and deteriorating eco- and environmental situations. To cope and pursue urbanization in a sustainable manner, the Chinese government has strenuously enacted an array of national urban environmental policies. This paper reviews these policies from “garden city,” “eco-city” to “low-carbon city” to determine the foci of the environment-related urban environmental policy developments under different periods in China. Two case studies of the renewable energy-exporting town of Rhein-Hunsrück district in Germany and the eco-town of Kitakyushu city in Japan are examined and analyzed to obtain enlightening factors in terms of their urban environmental policies as well as the references and implications from their successes and limits. Major findings indicate that the local autonomy and flexibility in policymaking and civic participation profoundly contributed to the successful switch to renewable energy in Germany’s case. For Japan’s case, government policy and financial support played significant role in transforming the industrialized city of Kitakyushu into sustainable practices center of eco-city. These experiences could offer insightful references to China’s low-carbon urban developments from different perspectives.

As climate problems deteriorate nowadays, urban air path is playing a positive role in promoting urban air circulation, mitigating heat island effect, and reducing air pollution. Despite certain domestic and international researches on the planning and layout of urban air path, few are about the building factors of the air path itself. In this chapter, the authors performed computer quantitative simulation for microscale and middle-scale urban green belt, which is the object of study. By making single factor simulation and comparative analysis of the three factors: the air path width, the angle between air path direction and prevailing wind direction, and the height of obstacles in air path, the authors evaluated the ventilation effectiveness of air path, which can provide a reference for the planning and construction of air path during the rapid urbanization period in China.

Development of the capital region in China now faces resources, environment, population, traffic, and various kinds of pressure. Spatial development on the capital region requires effective implementation of “human-oriented, low-carbon development”. Based on the view of the framework of low-carbon governance strategies for the capital region, it should works on areas as regional synergy, integration, enhance efficiency, maintain ecological, energy saving and emission reduction to achieve the goal of low-carbon and sustainable development. At the same time, also need to study on the management mechanism of regional coordination to promote regional low carbon development.

Experimental investigations were carried out to study the performance of lightweight radiant floor cooling combined with underfloor ventilation (LRFCUV) system. Operating parameters of LRFCUV system were recorded. Operating characteristic, heat-transfer capability, and thermal comfort of LRFCUV were analyzed based on experimental data. Experimental results indicate that thermal resistance of lightweight floor structure is considerable. Radiant heat-transfer capability occupies approximately 30 % of the total, and LRFCUV system shows fine thermal stability and thermal comfort.

Urban crisis mainly includes four categories. They are natural disasters, accidents, public health crisis, and social security issues. This paper points out the conduction mechanism of urban crisis under the background of big data and through empirical study and concludes that information conduction will intensify the panic among citizens and thus affects urban crisis. The current researches on urban crisis focus on crisis control in one city instead of cities. However, based on the rapid information transmission in the era of big data, panic caused by crisis will soon transmit to related cities, and start urban crisis in those cities too. Therefore, urban crisis conduction studied in this paper has practical significance in advanced warning for urban crisis.

The paper reports on a GIS-based approach to modeling carbon emissions through an urban community. The approach uses bottom-up modeling of urban form components (land use, buildings, and transportation network) to assess the community-wide carbon emission system. Model inputs (land cover, population, building types, vegetation structure) were integration of spatial and non-spatial data derived from diverse sources. Results are quantified and illustrated spatially as a whole system, and component carbon emissions are attributed to (i) buildings, (ii) transportation, (iii) residence, and (iv) vegetation.

With the development of economy, the service industry has become a new field of energy saving and emission reduction needed to explore. As the most major component of service industry, the energy saving and emission in transportation industry are paid more and more attention. The carbon emission in Beijing from 2005 to 2012 is accounted in this paper. With 2005 as the baseline year, the complete decomposition method is used to analyze Beijing’s transportation energy consumption and carbon emission. The conclusions are as follows: The overall transportation energy consumption and carbon emission show an upward trend in Beijing, and scale factor and energy consumption intensity factor are playing the catalytic role in transportation energy consumption and carbon emission. Among them, the industrial scale factor plays a major role on the growth of carbon emission in transportation industry. Energy consumption structure factor plays a smaller role on carbon emission in transportation industry, and it almost has no effect on energy consumption. This paper also proposes recommendations for future low-carbon development in Beijing transportation industry.

The environmental impact of construction of mountain town may be harmful and negative, such as aggravating environmental pollution, resource, or ecosystems, while may also be beneficial and positive, such as reducing environmental pollution, saving resources, or improving the environment. Firstly, the paper defines the intension and extension of the environmental cost and benefit in the construction of mountain town. Based on this, the paper analyzes the composition, indicators, and accounting methods of the environmental cost and benefit in the construction of mountain town.

Time series shapelets are a recent promising concept in time series data mining. Shapelets are time series snippets that can be used to classify unlabeled time series. Although shapelets are a useful concept, the current literature illustrates the fact that shapelet discovery is a time-consuming task. In this paper, we propose a fast shapelets discovery algorithm that outperforms the current algorithm; our experimental results demonstrate that the classification accuracy of the proposed algorithm is not significantly different from the accuracy obtained by the current algorithms, but the running time scalability is better.

Electric vehicles (EVs) charging stations in low-carbon city are widely distributed, and some of which use clean energy power supplies, such as solar cell and wind power; however, most of them are unattended. Thus, how to manage the equipment and operation process efficiently has become a problem that we must resolve as fast as possible. According to the needs for equipment and operation process monitoring in charging station, this chapter introduced the cyber-physical system into the charging station management. On the basis of cyber-physical-related technologies and fully considering equipment features and operation regulation, we designed and implemented a management system for EVs charging station, which has the functions of equipment monitoring, business process management, environmental perception, message notification, etc. The running results of this system show that this system is effective and feasible, which can provide reliable method of EVs station monitoring and management, while improves its operation efficiency as well as the supervision level.

The rate of China’s urbanization has risen from 18 % in 1978 to 53 % in 2012, especially with a significant speed in the past 10 years, but mainly the land’s urbanization, not the person’s urbanization. The population of first-tier cities soared, with a “big city disease,” such as strained resources and environmental damage. The second- and third-tier cities had a phenomenon of “empty city.” Therefore, we must develop low-carbon economy and implement economic transformation and sustainable development. In this paper, based on the research achievements of green finance in recent years, we define the basic connotation of green finance, and elaborate the mechanism of green finance, and put forward the recommendations of green credit, green insurance, green securities, and green risk investment.

With the world’s accelerating economic growth as well as the continuous expansion of the global population, the demand for energy and other resources from human society has correspondingly increased year by year. For the purpose of energy saving and environmental protection, a “low-carbon tide” has swept the globe. Despite of the bargaining in right and obligation associated with carbon emissions abatement, most countries per se have taken the low-carbon path to prepare for strategic competitiveness in the long run. Beyond all question, low-carbon economy would be a significant issue in China’s development, which has already orientated by policies such as National twelfth Five-year plan. As a typical resource-based city, Kaiyuan has consolidated and developed several pillar industries including coal, electricity, chemical, building materials, and food industries around its coal energy industry. The well-developed industrial system and especially the heavy industries have contributed a lot to local economy, however, also brought about severe challenges to the sustainable development of Kaiyuan. As a city whose 90 % energy depends on coal, Kaiyuan is suffering serious pressure in reduction of CO

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, SO

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, and oxynitride. Therefore, supportive works for Kaiyuan’s low-carbon planning are in sore need and could make profound meaning. This paper firstly establishes an accounting model for measurement of city’s carbon emissions in which every category, namely husbandry and energy consumption, which should be taken into account has been recognized. After the definition of accounting scope, the calculation method and standard for the emission of each category has been formulated. Some quantitative researches for the total carbon emissions and their sub-items have accordingly carried out to reveal the contradictions and problems during the development of Kaiyuan. Based on the current status as to carbon emissions, three sceneries, referred as Basic analysis unit (BAU), Basic policy (BP) and Low-carbon (LC) scenery, have been set up to check out the development goals for LC urban development of Kaiyuan. According to these analyses, some policy advices have been proposed for reference.