Abstract:

In the face of increasingly serious climate change， the action of the reduction of carbon emissions as one of the main measures to slow climate warming is imperative. There are both differences and similarities among the carbon emission characteristics of different regions， and the effective regional cluster analysis is the key to guide the research of regional low-carbon development by classification. Based on the problem of carbon emission and the possibility of emission reduction， this paper comprehensively evaluated the carbon emission reduction capacity of 14 prefecture-level cities in Gansu Province using the hierarchical clustering method. The results show that the 14 cities in Gansu Province can be divided into four groups， which have their own characteristics and whose emission reduction potential varies significantly. The classification results are comprehensive and do not fully reflect the regional continuity， thus， the classification guidance for carbon emission reduction cannot be based on geographical location. The effective low-carbon development paths with different characteristics should be implemented for different types of regions.

Key words: carbon emission reduction, clustering analysis, Gansu Province