The integrated night light (NTL) datasets were used to represent the economic development level, and visual analysis was carried out on the evolution characteristics of the economic spatial pattern of various urban agglomerations in the Yellow River Basin (YRB), at a county-scale, in 1992, 2005, and 2018. The Global Moran’s I and the local Getis-Ord G methods were used to explore the overall spatial correlation and local cold–hot spot of economic development levels, respectively. The spatial heterogeneity of the influence of relevant factors on the economic development level at the municipal scale was analyzed by using the multi-scale geographically weighted regression (MGWR) model. The results show that the county-level economic spatial pattern of urban agglomeration in the YRB has an obvious “pyramid” characteristic. The hot spots are concentrated in the hinterland of the Guanzhong Plain, the Central Plains, and the Shandong Peninsula urban agglomeration. The cold spots are concentrated in the junction of urban agglomerations, and the characteristics of “cold in the west and hot in the east” are obvious. Labor input and import and exporthave a positive impact on the economic development level for each urban agglomeration, government force has a negative impact, and education shows both positive and negative polarization on economic development.

The level of urbanization is a key factor in urban development. In this study, to better characterize the level of urbanization, the panel entropy weight method is used to weight the factors of population, industry, and area to construct a composite indicator of urbanization. A panel regression between this composite index and the average night light values after fusion shows a strong correlation. An accuracy test indicates that the estimated value of fused average light as calculated by the urbanization level estimation model that adequately represents the urbanization level. On this basis, night light data is corrected for zero error on the pixel scale, and spatiotemporal evolution analyses are performed on the city and county scales. The standard deviation ellipse method is used to find that the spatial distribution pattern of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei urbanization level from 1995 to 2018 radiates and spreads to the northeast, with Beijing-Tianjin as the center. The spatial pattern shows a contracting trend that is strengthening year by year. Slope analyses show that areas with rapid urbanization growth are mainly concentrated in Beijing and Tianjin. The urbanization development speed of most counties in the Hebei Province is at a low level.

The development of clean energy is a crucial strategy for combating climate change. However, the widespread adoption of wind power has led to significant challenges such as wind curtailment and power restrictions. A potential solution is the abandonment of onshore wind power for hydrogen production (AOWPHP). To ensure the sustainable development of clean energy, it is essential to assess the environmental impact of the AOWPHP. This study employs a life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology to evaluate the environmental impacts of the AOWPHP using QDQ2-1 alkaline electrolyzer technology in China. Furthermore, a scenario analysis is conducted to project these environmental impacts over the next 30 years. The findings indicate the following: (1) The global warming potential (GWP) over the life cycle is 5614 kg CO₂-eq, the acidification potential (AP) is 26 kg SO₂-eq, the human toxicity potential (HTP) is 12 kg DCB-eq, and the photochemical ozone creation potential (POCP) is 3.77 × 10⁻⁶ kg C₂H₄-eq. (2) Carbon emissions during the production stage significantly contribute to the environmental impact, with steel and concrete being notably polluting materials. The POCP shows high sensitivity at 0.97%, followed by the GWP and AP. (3) The scenario analysis indicates an upward trend in environmental impacts across low-speed, baseline, and high-speed development scenarios, with impacts peaking by 2050. For instance, under the high-development scenario in 2050, the GWP for each material reaches 41,808 kg CO₂-eq. To mitigate these impacts effectively, recommendations include reducing reliance on steel and concrete, developing green logistics, enhancing operational efficiency in wind farms and hydrogen production plants, and exploring new epoxy resin materials. These insights are crucial for promoting sustainable growth within the AOWPHP in China while reducing global carbon emissions.

Coal, which is an inexpensive energy source, has abundant reserves, but due to environmental issues, coal utilization has been decreased, dramatically. Despite fossil fuels energy sources, wind and solar energies are renewable, create zero emissions, are widely disturbed, and consume no hydrogen gas and water. China’s energy plan is multidimensional. The strategic plan 2010–2020 is intended to increase the portion of renewable energy sources for electricity production. In accordance with this plan, the renewable energy sector is highly encouraged. Thus, China intends to develop new renewable energy systems and reduce the dependency of fossil fuels energy. In this work, a detailed comparison of wind and solar systems was done to determine the advantages and disadvantages of these energy systems.

The severity of global climate change is a pressing issue, and carbon emission reduction requires collaboration between producers and consumers. Carbon emission responsibility accounting is critical for distributing the tasks associated with carbon reduction. To examine the current research status and future development trends of carbon emission responsibility accounting, we used the scientific quantitative knowledge graph method and CiteSpace software. We analyzed the data from 4089 studies retrieved from the Web of Science and China National Knowledge Infrastructure databases, focusing on various aspects such as the number of published papers, subjects, research focuses, research content, and future research directions. In 2022, the number of publications was 657. The largest number of published carbon emission responsibility accounting documents was published by scholars from China: there were 708 published articles, 35% of the 2002 articles published in the Web of Science. The reason may be that China, as a developing country, produces more carbon emissions. In order to actively shoulder international responsibilities and slow down global warming, China strengthened its research on carbon emission responsibility, the basic work on carbon emission reduction. This was followed by the United States and England. England showed high levels of research collaboration. “Environmental science” was one of the main subjects in the Web of Science database, representing 43.96% of total publications. Research focuses included input–output analyses and implied carbon export trade. This study summarizes the literature on carbon emission responsibility accounting in terms of research perspectives, accounting principles, and accounting methods. In the future, the accounting of carbon emission responsibility at the city level considering the carbon emission responsibility sharing method including three or more shared parties and accounting for the carbon emission responsibility between the upstream and downstream from the perspective of the industrial chain can be studied. The findings of this study provide guidance to researchers and policymakers for the progression and enhancement of carbon emission responsibility accounting.

Wind power technology is developing rapidly in China. Especially in the north of China, decentralized wind power (DWP) has developed rapidly. However, wind curtailment exceeds 4% of the gross generation, which has become an important obstacle restricting the development of DWP in 2019. Technical schemes are effective solutions to promote decentralized wind power consumption (DWPC). Moreover, there are few economic analyses of DWP projects with key technologies. This paper summarizes the typical technical schemes and analyzes the economy of a DWP grid-connected project with typical technical schemes by combining methods of the net present value (NPV) and real options (RO). It appears that the DWP project can be profitable with an NPV of about CNY 4.3721 million and an option value of CNY 16.6022 million in the case of a feed-in tariff of 0.34 CNY/kWh. Feed-in tariff and equipment investment costs are the most relevant parameters for economic feasibility according to the sensitivity analysis. Furthermore, 30.73 million kWh connects to the Mengxi grid each year. The project has an annual maximum CO₂ emission reduction of about 31 thousand tons and an SO₂ of about 0.1 thousand tons. In addition, it also realizes fine social benefits, including the support of local residents and the improvement of local new urbanization levels. Finally, this paper puts forward policy suggestions for the development of DWP mainly from an economic point of view.