Analysis of decoupling the link between transport and carbon emissions — Case of railway transport in China

Transportation is one of major sources of carbon emissions, and the study of relationship between carbon emissions and transportation is the hot topic in current. By improving the method to calculate carbon dioxide from IPCC, projected carbon dioxide emissions from China´s railway transport during the period of 1998–2008, then use Tapio decoupling indicators to empirical analysis between turnover of railway transport in China and carbon dioxide emissions, come to that China´s railway transport and CO2 emissions have a strong negative decoupling, Rail transport growth highly than carbon dioxide emissions growth, indicating that the emission reduction achieved initial success. But the current situation about energy conservation that our country facing is still not optimistic, this paper analyzes the structure of energy consumption of rail transport, put forward some recommendations to the railway transport of low-carbon development aimed at provide some help to the development of rail transport, as well as the development of low carbon on transport system.