ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Environmental Profit and Loss of Industry:
the Case of Textile Industry in Jiaxing
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1
School of Fashion Design and Engineering of Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou,
Zhejiang 310018, China
2
Office for Social Responsibility of China National Textile and Apparel Council, Beijing 100027, China
3
Institute of Science and Technology, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310018, China
4
Qingdao University, Qingdao, Shandong 266071, China
5
Clothing Engineering Research Center of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University,
Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310018, China
Submission date: 2021-11-24
Final revision date: 2022-04-06
Acceptance date: 2022-04-09
Online publication date: 2022-06-20
Publication date: 2022-09-01
Corresponding author
Laili Wang
School of Fashion Design & Engineering of Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310018, China
Pol. J. Environ. Stud. 2022;31(5):4137-4145
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ABSTRACT
The textile industry is a typical energy-intensive and water-intensive industry, causing a large
amount of greenhouse gas emission and wastewater discharge. How to evaluate the environmental
degradation caused by textile industry more intuitively and objectively has aroused great concern in
recent years. The Environmental Profit and Loss (EP&L) is a method to evaluate the environmental
impact intuitively as it converts different environmental impacts into a unified social marginal cost.
In this paper, EP&L methodology and an innovative indicator, which is Environmental Profit and Loss
intensity (EP&Lin), were applied to evaluate the environmental impacts caused by carbon dioxide
emission and water consumption of textile industry in Jiaxing from 2011 to 2018. The results showed that
the total EP&L value converted from carbon dioxide emission of textile industry in Jiaxing presented
an upward trend from 2011 to 2018. The maximum EP&L value due to carbon dioxide emission
reached to US$ 729 million in 2018. The total EP&L value of water consumption was increased from
US$ 0.4 million in 2011 to US$ 0.5 million in 2018. During this period the EP&Lin of textile industry
in Jiaxing went up from 0.1090 to 0.1283, and the EP&Lin of carbon dioxide emission was much
larger than that of water consumption. Additionally, among the three sub-sectors (manufacture of
textile, manufacture of chemical fibers and manufacture of textile, wearing apparel and accessories),
the manufacture of textile sector’s EP&L value converted from carbon dioxide emission and water
consumption accounted for approximately 60% of the total EP&L value of textile industry in Jiaxing,
much larger than that of the other two sub-sectors. The manufacture of chemical fibers sector had
the largest EP&Lin from 2012 to 2018. This result indicated that manufacture of chemical fibers in Jiaxing had a greater impact on the environmental degradation caused by carbon dioxide emission
and water consumption.