Understanding China's CO₂ emission drivers: Insights from random forest analysis and remote sensing data.

ABSTRACT: China has become the world's largest emitter of carbon dioxide, putting significant pressure on the government to reduce emissions. This study analyzes the driving factors of carbon emissions in 281 prefecture-level cities in China from 2003 to 2019, based on carbon emission data matched with the locations of thermal power stations and nighttime light data. Firstly, we compare the accuracy of multivariate linear regression and random forest models, finding that the random forest regression yields superior results. Then, we rank the impact of various factors using the random forest method, revealing that population, economic development, and industrialization are the top three influencing factors. The interaction between population and economic development explains 68.5% of carbon emissions

SUBMITTER: Lei Q 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11015412 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature