Built structures influence patterns of energy demand and CO2 emissions across countries

Built structures, i.e. the patterns of settlements and transport infrastructures, are known to influence per-capita energy demand and CO 2 emissions at the urban level. At the national level, the role of built structures is seldom considered due to poor data availability. Instead, other potential de...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature communications 2023-07, Vol.14 (1), p.3898-3898, Article 3898
Main Authors: Haberl, Helmut, Löw, Markus, Perez-Laborda, Alejandro, Matej, Sarah, Plank, Barbara, Wiedenhofer, Dominik, Creutzig, Felix, Erb, Karl-Heinz, Duro, Juan Antonio
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
704/844/682
704/844/685
706/689/694
Carbon dioxide
Carbon dioxide emissions
Demand
Emissions
Energy
Energy consumption
Humanities and Social Sciences
Level indicators
multidisciplinary
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
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Summary:Built structures, i.e. the patterns of settlements and transport infrastructures, are known to influence per-capita energy demand and CO 2 emissions at the urban level. At the national level, the role of built structures is seldom considered due to poor data availability. Instead, other potential determinants of energy demand and CO 2 emissions, primarily GDP, are more frequently assessed. We present a set of national-level indicators to characterize patterns of built structures. We quantify these indicators for 113 countries and statistically analyze the results along with final energy use and territorial CO 2 emissions, as well as factors commonly included in national-level analyses of determinants of energy use and emissions. We find that these indicators are about equally important for predicting energy demand and CO 2 emissions as GDP and other conventional factors. The area of built-up land per capita is the most important predictor, second only to the effect of GDP. Extent and spatial patterns of settlements and infrastructures strongly affect resource demand of national economies worldwide. Their influence on final energy and CO2 emissions is almost as large as that of gross domestic product (GDP).
ISSN:2041-1723
2041-1723
DOI:10.1038/s41467-023-39728-3