IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/chnrpt/v59y2023i4p349-368.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Onus on Coal Consumption and the ‘Beautiful China Initiative’: Economic and Policy Implications

Author

Listed:
  • Daniel Rajmil

    (Political Sciences and Law Faculty, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain. drajmil@uoc.edu)

  • Lucía Morales

    (School of Accounting, Economics and Finance, Technological University Dublin, Dublin, Ireland)

  • Bernadette Andreosso-O’Callaghan

    (Kemmy Business School, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland)

Abstract

China’s need for rapid economic growth and its hunger for natural resources significantly challenge its economic and policy vision of sustainability, social stability and economic development. The ‘Beautiful China Initiative’ plans to put China on the path of sustainable development in line with the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda and its Sustainable Development GoaSls. The Chinese authorities are expected to reconsider traditional economic policy models to integrate environmental protection while ensuring that their economy proliferates. The shift from a traditional and heavy coal-dependent economy towards greener energy and a sustainable economic model brings additional challenges to China due to its historical dependence on coal as its energy engine. This research paper examines causality patterns between economic growth and fossil fuels energy consumption by analysing coal consumption and carbon dioxide emissions policies using Pesaran’s autoregressive distributed lag model. The research findings offer insights into China’s challenges to transition towards a more sustainable economic model, making the country’s ‘Beautiful China Initiative’ quite complex as it needs to navigate through high levels of environment-friendly economic growth whilst trying to avoid the middle-income trap.

Suggested Citation

  • Daniel Rajmil & Lucía Morales & Bernadette Andreosso-O’Callaghan, 2023. "The Onus on Coal Consumption and the ‘Beautiful China Initiative’: Economic and Policy Implications," China Report, , vol. 59(4), pages 349-368, November.
  • Handle: RePEc:sae:chnrpt:v:59:y:2023:i:4:p:349-368
    DOI: 10.1177/00094455231188105
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00094455231188105
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/00094455231188105?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Feist, Marian & Geden, Oliver, 2023. "Climate negotiations in times of multiple crises: Credibility and trust in international climate politics after COP 27," SWP Comments 10/2023, Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP), German Institute for International and Security Affairs.
    2. Ji, Qiang & Zhang, Dayong, 2019. "How much does financial development contribute to renewable energy growth and upgrading of energy structure in China?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 114-124.
    3. Zhang, Yujiang & Feng, Guorui & Zhang, Min & Ren, Hongrui & Bai, Jinwen & Guo, Yuxia & Jiang, Haina & Kang, Lixun, 2016. "Residual coal exploitation and its impact on sustainable development of the coal industry in China," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 534-541.
    4. Li, Aijun & Zhang, Aizhen & Huang, Huijie & Yao, Xin, 2018. "Measuring unified efficiency of fossil fuel power plants across provinces in China: An analysis based on non-radial directional distance functions," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 549-561.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Wu, Wanlu & Cheng, Yuanyuan & Lin, Xiqiao & Yao, Xin, 2019. "How does the implementation of the Policy of Electricity Substitution influence green economic growth in China?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 251-261.
    2. Xu, Bin & Lin, Boqiang, 2021. "Investigating spatial variability of CO2 emissions in heavy industry: Evidence from a geographically weighted regression model," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 149(C).
    3. Jin Sheng & Avik Sinha & Sadia Mansoor & Muhammad Wasif Zafar, 2025. "Greening the energy future: Role of energy innovation as policy driver," Natural Resources Forum, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 49(2), pages 1424-1444, May.
    4. Skare, Marinko & Gavurova, Beata & Sinkovic, Dean, 2023. "Regional aspects of financial development and renewable energy: A cross-sectional study in 214 countries," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 1142-1157.
    5. Shen, Yiran & Liu, Chang & Sun, Xiaolei & Guo, Kun, 2023. "Investor sentiment and the Chinese new energy stock market: A risk–return perspective," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 395-408.
    6. Xiangye Wu & Shuai Wang & Jingya Wang & Zhongchen Wang & Shankun Zhao & Qingwei Bu, 2022. "Research on the Control of Mining Instability and Disaster in Crisscross Roadways," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(23), pages 1-19, November.
    7. Zheng, Mingbo & Zhang, Xinyu, 2025. "Digitalization and renewable energy development: Analysis based on cross-country panel data," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 319(C).
    8. Zian Chen & Sunhee Suk, 2023. "Analysis of Changes in Inter-Industrial Linkages and Economic Effects of Coal Industry in China Using Input–Output Model," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(20), pages 1-19, October.
    9. Ding, Yuanyi, 2023. "Does natural resources cause sustainable financial development or resources curse? Evidence from group of seven economies," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    10. Sun, Xiaoqi & Liu, Xiaojia, 2020. "Decomposition analysis of debt’s impact on China’s energy consumption," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    11. Wang, Yu & Gu, Jibao & Wu, Jianlin, 2020. "Explaining local residents’ acceptance of rebuilding nuclear power plants: The roles of perceived general benefit and perceived local benefit," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    12. Yujiang Zhang & Yining Wang & Bingyuan Cui & Guorui Feng & Shuai Zhang & Chunwang Zhang & Zhengjun Zhang, 2023. "A Disturbed Voussoir Beam Structure Mechanical Model and Its Application in Feasibility Determination of Upward Mining," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(20), pages 1-18, October.
    13. Kung, Chih-Chun & Wu, Tao, 2021. "Influence of water allocation on bioenergy production under climate change: A stochastic mathematical programming approach," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 231(C).
    14. Yunpeng Sun & Ruoya Jia & Asif Razzaq & Qun Bao, 2023. "RETRACTED ARTICLE: Drivers of China’s geographical renewable energy development: evidence from spatial association network structure approaches," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 56(6), pages 4115-4163, December.
    15. Wu, Shu & Han, Hongyun, 2022. "Energy transition, intensity growth, and policy evolution: Evidence from rural China," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C).
    16. Alizadeh, Reza & Gharizadeh Beiragh, Ramin & Soltanisehat, Leili & Soltanzadeh, Elham & Lund, Peter D., 2020. "Performance evaluation of complex electricity generation systems: A dynamic network-based data envelopment analysis approach," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    17. Yang, Tianjian & Qian, Peng & Lei, Tianyi, 2025. "Does ease of doing business promote renewable energy development? Evidence from 162 economies," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    18. Liu, Chang & Liu, Linlin & Zhang, Dayong & Fu, Jiasha, 2021. "How does the capital market respond to policy shocks? Evidence from listed solar photovoltaic companies in China," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    19. Wang, Di & Shen, Ye & Zhao, Yueying & He, Wei & Liu, Xue & Qian, Xiangyan & Lv, Tao, 2020. "Integrated assessment and obstacle factor diagnosis of China's scientific coal production capacity based on the PSR sustainability framework," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    20. Fan, Jing-Li & Zhang, Hao & Zhang, Xian, 2020. "Unified efficiency measurement of coal-fired power plants in China considering group heterogeneity and technological gaps," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:chnrpt:v:59:y:2023:i:4:p:349-368. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.