[Regional unlocking path in the north and south foothills of the Qinling Mountains from land use perspective].

The Qinling Mountains contain the largest forest ecosystem in central China. Examining the spatiotemporal variations of urban carbon lock-in and the pathways for unlocking it on the northern and southern piedmont of the Qinling hinterland is of great significance for achieving carbon balance in central and western China. Based on panel data from seven cities on the northern and southern piedmont of the Qinling Mountains from 2008 to 2022, we mea-sured regional carbon lock-in levels and carbon budgets from a land-use perspective, and investigated the spatio-temporal trends. We applied fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis to identify the high-carbon and low-carbon configuration effects of regional carbon lock-in at both macro and micro levels. The results showed that the degree of carbon lock-in in cities on the northern and southern piedmont of the Qinling Mountains increased from 1.79 to 5.61 and exhibited a certain degree of spatial clustering between 2008 and 2022. Net carbon emissions ranged from 31.22 Mt to 113.14 Mt, while carbon sinks remained in the range of 18 Mt to 21 Mt. The ratio of total carbon emission from construction land to that from cropland was 2.96:1. At the macro scale, regional carbon lock-in could be attributed to three configuration types: weak carbon sink function, gap in regulatory function, and misaligned industrial structure. At the micro scale, we identified nine high-carbon and ten low-carbon configurations. The main drivers of carbon emissions from natural ecosystem, construction land, and cropland were environmental regulation, industrial structure, and cropping structure, respectively. The degree of carbon lock-in in cities on the northern and southern piedmont of the Qinling Mountains followed a "slow-fast-slow" growth pattern. Spatially, it was characterized by lower in the south and higher in the north, with clustering that diffused from core cities to surrounding areas. On the basis of implementing overarching environmental policies, each region should select appropriate enhancement pathways in line with resource endowments and carbon lock-in drivers, so as to achieve the goal of carbon unlocking.