Spatial-temporal characteristics of ecological-living-productive land and its carbon emissions in Xinjiang from 1990 to 2018

Based on land use remote sensing monitoring and energy consumption data from 1990, 2000, 2010, and 2018 in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the dynamic index of land use change was used to analyze the change intensity of ecological-living-productive land type over the past 30 years, and to study its transformation patterns. Through the carbon emission calculation model, the carbon emissions and carbon emission intensity of land use in the study area were calculated, and changes in carbon emissions/absorption caused by land use transfer type were quantitatively analyzed. This was carried out in order to provide reference for low-carbon optimization, scientific planning, and management of land use structure and spatial allocation in Xinjiang region. The conclusions are as follows: 1) In the study area, the growth rate of living and production land and productive ecological land area is fast and the dynamic index is large, but the ecological production land and the ecological land areas are decreasing. Dynamic changes in land use mainly occurred from 2000 to 2010. 2) As the main source of carbon emissions, living and production land emissions increased by 142.316 6 million tons, with the largest annual growth rate from 2000 to 2010. The total carbon absorption of ecological production land decreased by 0.998 0 million tons. 3) The carbon emission intensity of living and production land increased from 4 207.90 t·km⁻² at the beginning to 18 423.55 t·km⁻² at the end of the study period, and the change of carbon emission/absorption intensity of the other three land uses was small. 4) Ecological land was mainly transferred to productive ecological land and living and production land, resulting in a 49.607 9 million ton increase in carbon emissions. Production ecological land was mainly transferred to living and production land, resulting in an increase of 24.287 2 million tons of carbon emissions. Ecological production land was mainly transferred to ecological land, resulting in a loss of 0.849 1 million tons of carbon absorption, which constitutes reverse ecological evolution. This study aimed to scientifically understand the space-time law and carbon emission effect of the transformation of Xinjiang’s ecological-living-productive land use, and it has important theoretical and practical significance for optimizing the allocation of ecological-living-productive land use and building a sustainable land use and protection pattern.