Decarbonization Path of Private Vehicle in China and Its Impact on Power Sector: A Provincial Study

Abstract

China’s road transport, especially private vehicles, has experienced continuous growth in energy consumption and carbon emissions in recent years. Electrification-driven net-zero pathways and their impacts on the power sector have drawn broad concern. Current research insufficiently explores vehicle-to-grid (V2G) advantages and fails to update data and assumptions aligned with the latest policies. This study establishes a provincial bottom-up model to calculate the energy demand and carbon emissions of private vehicles and evaluates decarbonization paths and their impacts on the power sector across different scenarios. Private vehicle ownership will rise first and then fall, hitting around 453 million by 2060. Near-term improvements in energy efficiency combined with the long-term diffusion of new energy vehicles can drive private transport toward net-zero emissions after 2050. Vehicle electrification raises electricity consumption remarkably, whereas V2G effectively mitigates carbon shift and offsets over half of cumulative power generation emissions. Marked regional disparities prevail in vehicle usage and emissions, with eastern China presenting higher values compared with western regions. Decarbonization of road transport is more than just addressing carbon shifting, and V2G facilitates cross-sector coordinated emission reduction. Future research is needed to explore the technical, economic and institutional potential for deepening decarbonization.