Abstract
The rapid economic development leads to excessive consumption of fossil energy, resulting in a large number of carbon emissions, which makes the sustainable development of China’s economy and society face great challenges. Under the background of global warming and environmental deterioration, developing low-carbon economy has become an inevitable choice for China to change its development model and improve its international competitiveness. Technological progress is the first driving force to promote economic growth. However, the influence degree and mechanism of technological progress on the development of low-carbon economy are still unclear. Based on this, the paper proposes the concept of low-carbon GDP, which is used to measure the low-carbon economic development of 30 Chinese provinces. Then, the panel fixed effect model is used to study the effect degree and mechanism of technological progress on low-carbon GDP and the moderating effect of other factors on the relationship between them. The results show that, first, economically developed provinces and regions have higher per capita low-carbon GDP and low-carbon GDP index, but the speed and quality of low-carbon economic development are not necessarily higher. Second, technological progress can promote the growth of low-carbon GDP and make greater contributions to resources-poor regions. Third, improving local education can make technological progress more effective in low-carbon economic development. China needs to upgrade technological development by developing new and high-tech technologies, promoting new urbanization and strengthening education in order to promote low-carbon economic development.
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This research is financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [Grant No. 72273151].
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by Xi Bi, Renjin Sun, Huihui Li and Nan Yu. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Xi Bi, and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Bi, X., Li, H., Sun, R. et al. How does technological progress affect low carbon economic growth? Evidence from regional heterogeneity in China. Environ Sci Pollut Res 31, 35498–35518 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-024-33571-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-024-33571-9