Abstract: From the perspective of environmental regulation, this research predicted the carbon emissions of energy consumption in Xinjiang from 2017 to 2030, and analyzed its impacts on carbon emission peaks, by applying the peak model and the scenario simulation method. Nine development models were set under the weak, medium and strong environmental regulation intensity scenarios to analyze the impact of environmental regulation on energy carbon emission peaks. The results of the research show that: (1) In the baseline scenario, the trend of the total carbon emission in Xinjiang is increasing, therefore, it will be hard to achieve the carbon emission peak target by 2030; (2) In the weak scenario, the carbon emissions of energy consumption in 2030 with the three development models of high, high-medium, high-low are 30 193.78×10⁴, 28 156.05×10⁴ and 26 244.80×10⁴ t, respectively; (3) In the medium and strong scenarios, the carbon emission peaks will be achieved in 2025 of the medium-low development model and in 2020 of the low-high development models with the peak quotas to be 20 682.63×10⁴ and 19 050.03×10⁴ t and the per capita GDPs to be 6.31×10⁴ and 5.13×10⁴ yuan, respectively. Among the nine development models, the target on carbon emission peak could only be achieved with the medium-low, low-high development models, which indicating that the implementation of strict environmental regulations can effectively reduce the carbon emissions of energy consumption in Xinjiang, and accelerate the achievement of the target on carbon emission peak.

Key words: environmental regulation, carbon emission, peak prediction, scenario simulation, Xinjiang