Analysis and prediction of carbon balance in production-living-ecological space of Henan Province, China

As the carrier of human economic activities, the change of territorial space affects the level of regional carbon balance. Therefore, with regional carbon balance as the goal, this paper proposed a framework from the perspective of production-living-ecological space and took Henan Province of China as a study area for empirical research. First, the study area established an accounting inventory that considers nature, society, and economic activities to calculate carbon sequestration/emission. Then, the spatiotemporal pattern of carbon balance was analyzed by ArcGIS from 1995 to 2015. Later, the CA-MCE-Markov model was used to simulate the production-living-ecological space pattern in 2035, and carbon balance in three future scenarios was predicted. The study showed that from 1995 to 2015, the living space gradually expanded, and the aggregation rose while the production space decreased. Carbon sequestration (CS) was less than carbon emission (CE) and presented an unbalanced state of negative income in 1995, while CS exceeded CE and showed a positive income imbalance in 2015. In 2035, living space has the highest carbon emission capacity under natural change scenario (NC), while ecological space has the highest carbon sequestration capacity under ecological protection scenario (EP), and production space has the highest carbon sequestration capacity under food security scenario (FS). The results are crucial for understanding the carbon balance changes in territorial space and supporting regional carbon balance goals in the future.