Assessment of greenhouse gas emissions reduction potential in an industrial park in China

Industrial parks play a significant role in economic development while consuming a great deal of energy and emitting a lot of greenhouse gas (GHG). Meanwhile, under the pressure of limiting the global average temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius as proposed by the Paris agreement, industrial parks have compelling obligation to reduce GHG emissions, driving them on the path to low-carbon development. This study established the GHG emission inventory and assessed carbon emission reduction potential in an industrial park. The GHG emission inventories were accounted from 2013 to 2017, including energy-related emission, industrial processes related emission and indirect emission from electricity. Then, three scenarios were designed to assess carbon emission reduction potential, as follows: industrial waste heat recovery scenario (WHR scenario), utilization of renewable energy (RNE scenario) and energy efficiency improvement scenario (EEI scenario). The results show that the total amount of GHG emission in 2017 was 14.9 Mt CO₂e, twice more than 2013, and the energy-related GHG emission was the dominant sector in the total GHG emission. Scenario analysis indicates that the total carbon emission reduction of the three approaches is 3.29 Mt CO₂. Among them, the measures of low-pressure waste heat recovery and energy efficiency improvement have great potential for carbon emission reduction in industrial parks. This study could provide a comprehensive understanding of GHG emission mitigation to improve the energy and environmental performance at the industrial park.