{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,10,15]],"date-time":"2026-10-15T17:00:14Z","timestamp":1792083614901,"version":"4.4.0"},"reference-count":25,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"15","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2022,8,5]],"date-time":"2022-08-05T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1659657600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"The National Social Science Fund of China","award":["22ZDA111"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["22ZDA111"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["IJERPH"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Transforming the growth mode and realizing green and low-carbon development has been a global consensus and an important governance concept of socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. Whether economic growth can be decoupled from carbon emissions and energy consumption is a key indicator for measuring green and low-carbon development and is an inevitable requirement for achieving the goal of carbon neutrality before 2060. Based on the input\u2013output tables for 2002, 2007, 2012, and 2018, this article calculated the embodied energy of export in China\u2019s foreign trade and studied the elastic relationship and trend between the growth of foreign trade exports and the total embodied energy of export since China\u2019s accession to the WTO. The following conclusions were drawn: (i) The embodied energy of China\u2019s export was strongly decoupled from total export for the first time from 2012 to 2018, signaling that China\u2019s economic, industrial, and energy structures entered a new stage. It was also the first strong decoupling achieved in the process of decoupling economic growth from energy consumption for the adoption of a low-carbon development path. Due to the pressure of international competition, the export sector had a relatively advanced level of efficiency, so it achieved decoupling earlier than the overall manufacturing sector and the consumption sector, which was in line with economic laws and the characteristics of China\u2019s development stage. (ii) From 2007 to 2018, the embodied energy of export occupied a much smaller proportion of China\u2019s total energy consumption, falling from the peak of 31.48% in 2007 to 26.57%, a drop of 4.91 percentage points. It showed that a larger share of energy consumption had taken place domestically and that the model mainly relying on export expansion to drive economic growth had begun to adjust. The conclusion of this research could also support the assertion of \u2018accelerating the construction of a new development pattern with the domestic economic cycle as the main body and the domestic and international dual cycles promoting each other\u2019 from the perspective of external exports and energy consumption. (iii) A causal analysis of the decoupling between the embodied energy of export and export volume demonstrated that, from 2002 to 2007 and from 2007 to 2012, the embodied energy of export and total export maintained the same direction but had different growth rates. The increase in total export volume was the main reason affecting the embodied energy of export. With the rapid growth of total export volume, the embodied energy of export was also growing rapidly. From 2012 to 2018, the embodied energy of export declined, and an analysis showed that the \u2018total energy consumption coefficient\u2019, i.e., technology effect, was the primary cause of the decline. With China\u2019s high-quality development, green transformation, and other strategic advancements, the decoupling trend is expected to continue and expand to a larger economic field.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/ijerph19159625","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2022,8,5]],"date-time":"2022-08-05T02:12:39Z","timestamp":1659665559000},"page":"9625","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":6,"title":["Decoupling of the Growing Exports in Foreign Trade from the Declining Gross Exports of Embodied Energy"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"19","author":[{"given":"Wenmei","family":"Kang","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Applied Economics, University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing 102488, China"},{"name":"Research Center for Sustainable Development, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing 100732, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Mou","family":"Wang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Applied Economics, University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing 102488, China"},{"name":"Research Center for Sustainable Development, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing 100732, China"},{"name":"Research Institute for Eco-civilization, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing 100710, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Ying","family":"Chen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Applied Economics, University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing 102488, China"},{"name":"Research Institute for Eco-civilization, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing 100710, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Ying","family":"Zhang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Applied Economics, University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing 102488, China"},{"name":"Research Institute for Eco-civilization, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing 100710, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2022,8,5]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","unstructured":"World Resources Institute (WRI) (2021, September 21). The Roads to Decoupling: 21 Countries Are Reducing Carbon Emissions While Growing GDP 2016. Available online: https:\/\/www.wri.org\/insights\/roads-decoupling-21-countries-are-reducing-carbon-emissions-while-growing-gdp."},{"key":"ref_2","first-page":"980","article-title":"Peak forecast of Chinese energy consumption based on developed countries\u2019 trends","volume":"36","author":"Ma","year":"2016","journal-title":"Sci. Geogr. Sin."},{"key":"ref_3","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"137","DOI":"10.1016\/j.tranpol.2005.01.001","article-title":"Towards a theory of decoupling: Degrees of decoupling in the EU and the case of road traffic in Finland between 1970 and 2001","volume":"12","author":"Tapio","year":"2005","journal-title":"Transp. Policy"},{"key":"ref_4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"636","DOI":"10.1016\/j.eneco.2007.01.005","article-title":"Decomposition analysis for assessing the progress in decoupling industrial growth from CO2 emissions in the EU manufacturing sector","volume":"29","author":"Diakoulaki","year":"2007","journal-title":"Energy Econ."},{"key":"ref_5","first-page":"47","article-title":"Research on the regional variation of carbon productivity in China","volume":"5","author":"Pan","year":"2011","journal-title":"China Ind. Econ."},{"key":"ref_6","first-page":"99","article-title":"Methods of measuring decoupling of resource environment: Speed decoupling or quantity decoupling?","volume":"25","author":"Sheng","year":"2015","journal-title":"China Popul. Resour. Environ."},{"key":"ref_7","first-page":"18","article-title":"Regional economic development and carbon productivity\u2014A convergent and decoupling index analysis","volume":"5","author":"Zhang","year":"2013","journal-title":"China Ind. Econ."},{"key":"ref_8","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"5920","DOI":"10.1016\/j.enpol.2011.06.046","article-title":"An overview of energy consumption of the globalized world economy","volume":"39","author":"Chen","year":"2011","journal-title":"Energy Policy"},{"key":"ref_9","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1712","DOI":"10.1038\/s41467-017-01820-w","article-title":"Chinese CO2 emission flows have reversed since the global financial crisis","volume":"8","author":"Mi","year":"2017","journal-title":"Nat. Commun."},{"key":"ref_10","first-page":"113","article-title":"Study on embodied energy in international trade against globalization","volume":"5","author":"Cui","year":"2014","journal-title":"J. Int. Trade"},{"key":"ref_11","first-page":"26","article-title":"Research on the cross-border transfer of embodied energy under global production division system","volume":"29","author":"Guo","year":"2019","journal-title":"China Popul. Resour. Environ."},{"key":"ref_12","first-page":"11","article-title":"Energy embodied in goods of international trade in China: Calculation and policy implications","volume":"43","author":"Chen","year":"2008","journal-title":"Econ. Res. J."},{"key":"ref_13","first-page":"8","article-title":"Accounting embodied carbon in import and export in China","volume":"18","author":"Qi","year":"2008","journal-title":"China Popul. Resour. Environ."},{"key":"ref_14","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"418","DOI":"10.1016\/j.enpol.2013.02.009","article-title":"Analysis of energy embodied in the international trade of UK","volume":"57","author":"Tang","year":"2013","journal-title":"Energy Policy"},{"key":"ref_15","first-page":"16","article-title":"Analysis of embodied CO2 in China-UK trade","volume":"30","author":"Xu","year":"2014","journal-title":"Int. Econ. Trade Res."},{"key":"ref_16","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"110","DOI":"10.1016\/j.enpol.2014.04.024","article-title":"Calculation of embodied energy in Sino-USA trade: 1997\u20132011","volume":"72","author":"Yang","year":"2014","journal-title":"Energy Policy"},{"key":"ref_17","first-page":"39","article-title":"Research on embodied energy in China-USA trade with MRIO model","volume":"31","author":"Wei","year":"2017","journal-title":"Soft Sci."},{"key":"ref_18","first-page":"26","article-title":"The energy consumption by China\u2019s foreign trade: An analysis based on non-competitive input-output method","volume":"4","author":"Chen","year":"2014","journal-title":"J. World Econ."},{"key":"ref_19","first-page":"1365","article-title":"Embodied energy in international trade of China: Calculation and decomposition","volume":"13","author":"Xie","year":"2014","journal-title":"China Econ. Q."},{"key":"ref_20","first-page":"94","article-title":"Embodied energy calculation of China\u2019s foreign trade based on the improved method","volume":"26","author":"Zhang","year":"2016","journal-title":"China Popul. Resour. Environ."},{"key":"ref_21","first-page":"1456","article-title":"Analysis of embodied energy and transfer emissions of China\u2019s import and export trade","volume":"50","author":"Gu","year":"2010","journal-title":"J. Tsinghua Univ. (Sci. Technol.)"},{"key":"ref_22","first-page":"54","article-title":"Accounting embodied energy and environmental analysis in China\u2019s import and export: Based on the correction method of input-output","volume":"30","author":"Liu","year":"2015","journal-title":"Stat. Inf. Forum"},{"key":"ref_23","first-page":"103","article-title":"China\u2019s energy consumption embodied in exports and the decomposition analysis of its influencing factors","volume":"3","author":"Pang","year":"2012","journal-title":"Inq. Into Econ. Issues"},{"key":"ref_24","first-page":"63","article-title":"Analysis of deficit of ecology and eco-friendly trade\u2014Based on energy embodied in China","volume":"26","author":"Xu","year":"2012","journal-title":"East China Econ. Manag."},{"key":"ref_25","first-page":"41","article-title":"Research on the energy consumption by China\u2019s exports","volume":"28","author":"Zhu","year":"2011","journal-title":"Stat. Res."}],"container-title":["International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/1660-4601\/19\/15\/9625\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T00:04:26Z","timestamp":1760141066000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/1660-4601\/19\/15\/9625"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2022,8,5]]},"references-count":25,"journal-issue":{"issue":"15","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2022,8]]}},"alternative-id":["ijerph19159625"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/ijerph19159625","relation":{},"ISSN":["1660-4601"],"issn-type":[{"value":"1660-4601","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2022,8,5]]}}}