Input-output models for carbon accounting: A multi-perspective analysis

To achieve carbon neutrality, the collaborative involvement of various entities, such as nations, regions, and industries plays a crucial role. As a valuable tool to undertake macro-level research on carbon emissions, input-output analysis can provide insights and references to formulate effective policies and measures for carbon reduction. Therefore, 1156 carbon emission studies based on the input-output method were critically reviewed in this study. Meanwhile, the bibliometric method was employed to analyze the number of studies, academic influence and collaborative networks of countries, institutions and journals, as well as cluster analysis of keywords. The findings show a significant increase in the number of papers in this field, China, the USA, and the UK emerged as the most influential countries in this field. Apart from quantitative analysis, this study incorporates a qualitative analysis of the literature from the perspectives of research objects and research methods. It is observed that, carbon footprint inequality and embodied carbon transfer of trade receive a lot of attention. In addition, and there are still gaps remain in the research of carbon emission at city level and emerging industries. There is an urgent need to improve the comprehensiveness and refinement of carbon emission related research based on IO model. This paper proposes future research directions in data, topics, methods and application of research results. This helps to explore future research agenda, to formulate carbon emission reduction policies, and to promote the global carbon neutrality process.