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How low-carbon innovation drives city’s green development? Evidence from China

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Abstract

The development of a city’s green infrastructure is increasingly being driven by low-carbon innovation (LCI). However, knowledge of how LCI affects green economic efficiency (GEE) in China is largely unknown. This study investigates the spatial effects of LCI on GEE in 285 Chinese prefecture-level cities. The empirical findings show that LCI exerts significant beneficial effects on its GEE but negative effects on its neighbors. The positive direct effects on GEE are offset by negative indirect effects due to the lack of spatial linkage effect and the existence of the siphon and crowding-out effects among cities. Using a mediating effect model, we have identified three channels of LCI that affect GEE: industrial structure, energy consumption structure, and human capital. A further heterogeneity analysis indicates that the impacts of LCI on GEE differ by region and city development level. Furthermore, LCI in the building, greenhouse gas treatment, transportation, and sewage and pollutant treatment categories could greatly enhance local GEE. The findings herein provide an empirical experience for accurately accessing the spatial effect of LCI on GEE, and offer a critical decision-making reference for implementing a cross-city green linkage development mechanism.

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Data availability

The datasets generated or analyzed during this study are available from the first author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the National Planning Office of Philosophy and Social Science Foundation of China (22BJL030) and Cultivation Project of the Major Research for Medium and Long-term Research in Philosophy and Social Sciences of Northeast Normal University (22FR006).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Economics and Management, Northeast Normal University, Changchun, 130117, China

    Huimin Ren

  2. School of Geographical Sciences, Northeast Normal University, Changchun, 130024, China

    Guofeng Gu & Honghao Zhou

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  1. Huimin Ren
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  2. Guofeng Gu
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Contributions

HR contributed to writing—original draft, methodology, software. GG contributed to conceptualization, funding acquisition, and supervision. HZ contributed to methodology, writing–review and editing, validation, and supervision.

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Correspondence to Guofeng Gu.

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Appendices

Appendix

Appendix A

See Tables 10, 11, 12 and 13.

Table 10 Abbreviations
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Table 11 Description of input–output indicators in dependent variable
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Table 12 Detailed description of the LCI classification
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Table 13 Global spatial autocorrelation test results
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Appendix B

MATLAB code for measuring the GEE.

figure a
figure b

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Ren, H., Gu, G. & Zhou, H. How low-carbon innovation drives city’s green development? Evidence from China. Environ Dev Sustain 26, 9335–9367 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-023-03098-z

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