scholarly journals Does Environmental Regulation Promote Industrial Green Technology Progress? Empirical Evidence from China with a Heterogeneity Analysis

Author(s):  
Yanli Ji ◽  
Jie Xue ◽  
Kaiyang Zhong

The complex relationship between environmental regulation and green technology progress has always been a hot topic of research, especially in developing countries, where the impact of environmental regulation is important. Current research is mainly concerned with the impact of the single environmental regulation on technological progress and lacks study on the diversity of environmental regulations. The main purpose of this paper is to examine the heterogeneity of the effects of different types of environmental regulation on industrial green technology progress. As China’s scale of economy and pollution emissions are both large, and the government has also made great efforts in environmental regulation, this paper takes China as the example for analyses. We first use the EBM-GML method to measure the industrial green technology progress of 30 provinces in China from 2000 to 2018, and then apply the panel econometric model and threshold model to empirically investigate the influence of 3 types of environmental regulation. The results show that, first, the impacts of environmental regulation on industrial green technology progress are significantly different; specifically, command-based regulation has no direct significant impact, and autonomous regulation has played a positive role, and market-based regulation’s quadratic curve effect is significant, in which the cost-based and investment-based tool presents an inverted U-sharped and U-sharped, respectively. Second, there may be a weak alternative interaction among different types of environmental regulation. Third, a market-based regulatory tool has a threshold effect; with the upgrading of environmental regulation compliance, the effect of a cost-based tool is characterized by “promotion inhibition”, and that of an investment-based tool is “inhibition promotion”. Finally, the results of regional analysis are basically consistent with those of the national analysis. Based on the study, policy enlightenment is put forward to improve regional industrial green technology progress from the perspective of environmental regulation. This paper can provide a useful analytical framework for studying the relationship between environmental regulation and technological progress in a country, especially in developing countries.

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 3841 ◽  
Author(s):  
Songping Zhu ◽  
Azhong Ye

The reverse technology spillover effect of Outward Foreign Direct Investment (OFDI) has been widely discussed. In the context of pursuing green growth, a few scholars began to study the impact of OFDI on home country green technological progress or green total factor productivity. However, few of these papers have made a thorough analysis of how OFDI affects the home country’s green technological progress, and have not considered the impact of different types of OFDI on green technological progress. This paper extends the basic analysis framework of technological progress to green technological progress, and discusses for the first time the ways for China to invest in developed and developing countries to achieve green technological progress. Specifically, this paper combines the global Malmquist productivity concept with the directional distance function to construct the global Malmquist Luenberger (GML) index to describe green technological progress of China’s provinces, and uses panel data model from 2003 to 2016 to study the impact of China’s investment in different types of countries. The results show that: (1) China’s investment in developed countries can bring reverse green technology spillovers and promote China’s green technology progress. But this is also affected by China’s domestic human capital stock, the increase in human capital stock is conducive to the absorption of green technology. (2) OFDI flows to transition or developing countries have failed to bring about green technological progress, but domestic R&D capital stock can produce a control response. (3) Environmental regulation, import trade and domestic R&D capital stock can bring positive effects on green technology progress, while foreign direct investment, fiscal decentralization and economic growth hinder green technology progress. (4) There is regional heterogeneity in the impact of OFDI with different directions on green technological progress. Because of environmental regulation and economic development, the eastern region of China is easier to obtain reverse green technology progress than the central and western regions in the process of OFDI.


2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Xubin Lei ◽  
Shusheng Wu

Based on the distinction of different types of environmental regulations, this paper attempts to test the threshold effect of environmental regulation on the total factor productivity (TFP) by employing a panel threshold model and a province-level panel data set during 2006–2016. Research results show that the influence of command-and-control and market incentive environmental regulation on the total factor productivity has a single threshold conversion characteristic of foreign direct investment (FDI) and financial scale, but the impact behavior and influence degree around the threshold are inconsistent. The effect of voluntary conscious environmental regulation on the total factor productivity has a single threshold conversion feature of human capital, and moderately enhanced intensity of environmental regulation is conducive to promoting the total factor productivity after crossing the threshold. Finally, in order to enhance the regional total factor productivity, relevant policy recommendations are proposed.


2018 ◽  
Vol 53 ◽  
pp. 04054
Author(s):  
Xuefei Xu ◽  
Lili Wang ◽  
Shang Chen

As green growth has attracted a great deal of attention due to the growing concern about the degradation of natural resources and environmental pollution in China, the questions of how to achieve it and which factors drive green growth have become hot topics. Environmental regulation and technological innovation are two main fulcrums in the realization of green growth. However, there is lacking a deeper understanding of the impact of environmental regulation and technological innovation on green growth in a methodological framework. Accordingly, this paper attempts to analyze how these factors affect the implementation of green growth in a model. The findings reveal that (1) in the short term, environmental regulation has inhibited green growth, but has a positive impact on green growth in the long run, (2) technological innovation plays a positive role in green growth improvement, and (3) the causality chain among regulation, technological innovation, and green growth is a typical mediation model. Technological innovation plays an important mediation role in the causal chain. This study not only enriches and deepens theories on green growth, but also successfully implements green growth practices and improve their performance.


2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 112 ◽  
Author(s):  
KamiliaKamilia LoukilLoukil

We investigate in this paper the effect of financial development on innovation in emerging and developing countries. The estimation of panel threshold model for a sample 54 countries during the period 1980-2009 shows the presence of non linear effects in the relationship between financial development and innovation. We find a threshold value of economic development below which the financial development level has no significant impact on innovation and above which financial development has a significant positive impact on innovation. In sum, our findings suggest that the presence of a healthy economic environment is crucial for financial institutions to offer high-quality financial services, promoting more innovation.


Author(s):  
Yi ◽  
Fang ◽  
Wen ◽  
Guang ◽  
Zhang

Environmental regulation is an important driving force of green technology innovation. In this paper, environmental policy instruments are classified into three categories: command-control, market-incentive and social-will. Based on the panel data of 30 provinces in China from 2010 to 2017, a fixed effect model and a panel threshold regression model are used to test the heterogeneous effects of different types of environmental policy instruments on the green technology innovation in China. The results show that: (1) Overall, China’s environmental policy instruments do not provide sufficient impetus for green technology innovation; (2) The impact of command-control environmental policy instruments on green technology innovation has a single threshold effect. When its intensity exceeds a certain threshold, green technology innovation is improved. The impact of market-incentive environmental policy instruments on the green technology innovation shows a double threshold effect, that is to say, only when its intensity maintained within a reasonable interval, can green technology innovation be promoted by it; (3) There is significant spatial difference in the impact of different types of environmental policy instruments on green technology innovation. In order to induce green technology innovation, it is necessary to formulate a combined and differentiated environmental policy system, while rationally adjusting the strength of different types of environmental policy instruments.


Author(s):  
Qingyang Wu

Abstract:This paper uses the balanced panel data from 29 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) in China for a total of 17 years from 2000 to 2016 as a research sample, and establishes an empirical model to examine the impact of environmental regulations and technological innovation on the quality of economic growth. Then this paper test technological innovation as a threshold variable, in which play a regulatory role. Taking the provincial balanced panel data as a research sample, a fixed effect model, a system GMM model, and a panel threshold model were established for empirical testing and the robustness test. Based on the empirical results, this article draws the following conclusions: from a national perspective, environmental regulations and technological innovation can significantly promote the quality of economic growth; from a regional perspective, there are regional differences in impact effects. Under the constraints of environmental regulations, the promotion effect of technological innovation on the quality of economic growth will be reduced; the impact of environmental regulation on the quality of economic growth will have a "threshold effect", and environmental regulation can significantly promote the quality of economic growth only after crossing the threshold and the threshold of technological innovation.


Author(s):  
Pei Wang ◽  
Cong Dong ◽  
Nan Chen ◽  
Ming Qi ◽  
Shucheng Yang ◽  
...  

Economic development in the “new era” will require green innovation. To encourage the growth of green technology innovation, it has become fashionable to strengthen environmental regulation. However, the impact of environmental regulation on green technology innovation, as well as the role of government subsidies, needs to be examined. Utilizing fixed-effect models and 2SLS models to explore the impact of environmental regulation on green technology innovation in China from 2003 to 2017, this research sought to examine whether environmental regulations impact green technology innovation, as well as the role of government subsidies in the above-mentioned influence path. The findings support the Porter Hypothesis by demonstrating an inverted “U” relationship between environmental regulation and green technology innovation. The impact of environmental regulation on green technology innovation varies by region. To be specific, there is an inverted “U” relationship between environmental regulation and green technology innovation in China’s central and central coast regions. In comparison, the north area, southern coast, and southwest region exhibit a “U” relationship between the two. The relationship is not significant in the Beijing-Tianjin region. Additionally, government subsidies act as an intermediate in this process, positively influencing firms to pursue green technology innovation during the earliest stages of environmental regulation strengthening. However, government subsidies above a certain level are unproductive and should be used appropriately and phased off in due course.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Hui Li ◽  
Chuandang Zhao ◽  
Xiaoying Tang ◽  
Jiawei Cheng ◽  
Guanyang Lu ◽  
...  

Environmental regulation policies are being continuously enriched today. To effectively improve green innovation efficiency through environmental regulations, it is urgent to better understand the impact of different environmental regulations on green innovation efficiency (GIE). However, due to the defects of previous methods for measuring GIE, existing studies may have deviations when analysing the effect of environmental regulations on GIE. To fill this gap, using Shaanxi, China, as a case study, the present study proposes a network data envelopment analysis (DEA) model based on neutral cross-efficiency evaluation to accurately measure the GIE of Shaanxi during the period of 2001–2017. On this basis, this study further analysed the impact of different types of environmental regulations on GIE from three aspects: causality, evolutionary relationships, and effect paths. The results indicate that (1) the GIE of Shaanxi Province showed a “fluctuation-slow growth-steady growth” trend during 2001–2017, and after 2014, the problem of an uncoordinated relationship between technology research and design (R&D) and technology transformation began to appear; (2) there was a linear evolutionary relationship between command-and-control environmental regulation and GIE and a “U”-shaped evolutionary relationship between market-based/voluntary environmental regulation and GIE; and (3) command-and-control environmental regulation and voluntary environmental regulation affected GIE mainly at the technology R&D stage, while market-based environmental regulation ran through the entire process of green innovation activities. This study improves the evaluation methods and theoretical systems of GIE and provides the scientific basis for government decision-makers to formulate environmental regulation policies.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
Shuangliang Yao ◽  
Xiang Su

This paper uses the super-efficiency SBM model to measure the green economic efficiency considering undesired output and analyzes the spatial distribution difference of green economic efficiency; secondly, the nonlinear panel threshold model is used to empirically study the nonlinear relationship between environmental regulations and green economic efficiency, and further analyzed the threshold effect of environmental regulations on the efficiency of green economy and concluded as follows. (1) The green economy efficiency index in the eastern region is mostly more significant than 1, and the green economy efficiency in most provinces in the eastern region has improved. These provinces have higher regional production levels and less environmental pollution. The green economy efficiency of the central region is second only to the eastern region. The green economy efficiency of provinces in the western region except Chongqing is less than 1, indicating that these provinces have insufficient regional production, severe environmental pollution, or extensive resource depletion. (2) The impact of environmental regulations on the efficiency of the green economy presents an inverted “U” shape, with a threshold of 0.5128 for environmental regulations. The impact of the industrial structure on the efficiency of the green economy changes from inhibition to promotion after crossing the threshold of the intensity of environmental regulation, and the degree of opening to the outside world has a complementary effect on the efficiency of the green economy. The impact of urbanization on the efficiency of the green economy changes from promotion to suppression after surpassing the threshold of the intensity of environmental regulations.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mengxin Wang ◽  
Yanling Li ◽  
Gaoke Liao

Against the background of carbon peaking and carbon neutralization, green technology innovation plays an important role in promoting the energy total factor productivity (TFP). This study verifies the impact of green technology innovation on energy TFP in a complete sample and the subsamples by region, by constructing a panel threshold model, and analyzes its influence mechanism on the basis of the mediating effect test based on annual provincial data of mainland China from 2005 to 2018. The empirical results reveal the following: first, with the level of economic development as the threshold variable, there is a threshold effect in the impact of green technology innovation on the energy TFP; second, green technology innovation has an impact on the energy TFP through industrial structure upgrading; that is, industrial structure has a mediating effect in the influence mechanism; and third, there is heterogeneity in the impact of green technology innovation on the energy TFP among different regions in China, and the threshold effect only exists in the western region, since the central and eastern regions have crossed a certain developmental stage.


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