Societal metabolism analysis of China's four municipalities based on MSIASM theory and carbon emissions from energy consumption

The Multi-Scale Integrated Assessment of Societal Metabolism method has been widely used to comprehensively evaluate levels of social development and sustainability.It can also be regarded as the basis of urban development policy creation for urban managers and decision-makers.However,although there is an increasing amount of research about variables and scales of the method,very little focuses on the ecological aspect and the impacts of scale on the variables.This study evaluates the societal metabolism and comprehensive development situation of China' s four municipalities between 2004 and 2010 by adopting the method of Multi-Scale Integrated Assessment of Societal Metabolism(MSIASM).This method includes indicators of Exosomatic Metabolic Rate and Energy Intensity at different organizational scales,as well as Bio-economic Pressure.The carbon emissions from energy consumption was first introduced into MSIASM to assess the ecological aspect of urban development and to assess the impacts of different organizational scales on the indicators The results demonstrates that overall development of China's four municipalities' societal metabolism is in good condition with a steady increase in Exosomatic Metabolic Rate and Bio-economic Pressure and a ceaseless decrease in energy intensity andcarbon emissions per unit of energy consumption.In terms of the integrated performance of social economic systems,each municipality reflected its own unique developmental characteristics.In the case of Shanghai,the gradual downsizing of the agricultural industry and the high-level development of the manufacturing industry,reflected the typical characteristics of the late-industrialization city in China.The development of Beijing showed a close relationship with the city' s preparation for the Olympic Games.This included strict limitations on energy investment and industrial pollution as well as vigorous development on the construction of transportation infrastructure.Tianjin's development presented the status of the booming manufacturing industry and the relatively lagging service industry,which are the features of a rapidly industrializing city in general.The overall level of development level in Chongqing was lower than the other three cities,embodying the city' s traits during the transformation of industry structure from agriculture to industrialization.Additionally,the indicators were affected by scale and show different characteristics,especially for the Exosomatic Metabolic Rate,Energy Intensity and Economic Labor Productivity under the industry scale.The prominent role of controlling the energy consumption of the manufacturing industry and the transportation department on rising energy efficiency of production.The development of low energy consumption and high economic productivity industry such as the financial industry and the computer industry are also very important to take into consideration.In conclusion,this study introduces ecological indicators and dynamic working time data into the classic MSIASM method for a more comprehensive evaluation of the city' s sustainability and firstly applies the model down to the industry scale.It can detect the composite effects of number of employee and average working hour.It provides a new perspective for environmental impact assessment of energy use and a new tool to guide future urban planning and development.Based on the result that EMR and BER show different characteristics under different scales,this method should be carefully used when face to evaluate the level of regional social development.