Carbon Footprints (CF) is an international open-access journal dedicated to publishing all aspects of the knowledge on the emissions of not only all greenhouse gases (CO2, CH4, N2O, etc.) but also low-carbon energy transformation and air pollutants, climate change during a given period produced directly or indirectly to support human activities. The journal aims to advance the understanding of the extent of the carbon, energy, and air pollutants footprint associated with various human activities, the patterns, and processes governing it, technologies of carbon capture, utilization, and storage, the nature of interactions between carbon, energy and air pollutants footprint and other factors that influence the ecosystem, urban system, industrial system services. Based on a broad academic background, the journal scope is divided into four major sectors below:
Ecosystems: Land use changes are responsible for a significant part of greenhouse gas emissions and air pollutants emissions. Stabilizing greenhouse gas emissions and air pollutants from croplands as agricultural demand grows is a critical climate change mitigation strategy. Depending on management, the Agriculture, Forestry, and Other Land Use sector can be both a source as well as a net sink for carbon and air pollutants. Sustainable management, conservation, and restoration of Marine ecosystems to provide carbon sequestration and other ecosystem services on which humans depend are essential. Besides, water resources utilization and protection innovation systems under the background of carbon neutrality are also included in this subject.
Urban Systems: The complex systems with anthropogenic features that generate considerable CO2 emissions contribute to global climate change. Further development of new technologies, such as big data and artificial intelligence, to assess the carbon footprint of Urban Systems is anticipated to help address the emerging challenges in urban ecosystem research effectively to achieve carbon neutrality and urban sustainability under global change. In addition, specific fields such as transportation and mobility, the built environment and community structure, waste recycling management, food production, and consumption related to carbon accounting and emissions are included in this subject.
Industrial Systems: During industrial processes, carbon footprints should be traced and calculated. This chapter includes the description and accounting of the ecological footprint of major industries and industrial chains, as well as the low-carbon transformation technology and path of the manufacturing industry. From other aspects, in the past years, carbon storage during industrial processes has been made possible with the technological advancement applied in industrial systems. In this regard, carbon footprints are deserved to be paid more attention to. Apart from traditional industries, carbon footprints in recycled industries associated with waste re-utilization and recovery is also an interesting research field.
Environmental and Resource Economics: Economic analysis of the social impacts of the environment and resources (e.g., energy conservation, carbon mitigation, and pollution reduction) is crucial to global sustainable development. This section focuses on the assessment of public policy. Submitted articles should carefully consider identified empirical results or creative methodologies that are novel and of broad interest to their readership. Additionally, interdisciplinary work from diverse teams of researchers, who concentrate on energy economics, urban economics, transport economics, health economics, or agricultural economics is welcome.
The journal welcomes original articles, reviews, systematic reviews, perspectives, and commentaries on the mentioned subjects. Contributions reporting the investigations on topics of fundamental or applied nature on biophysical and socioeconomic issues are welcome. Excessively descriptive accounts and repetitions of well-established findings are discouraged. The results of field studies must be relevant to a context wider than the specific location where the study was undertaken and provide new insights or make a significant contribution to the knowledge base.
