Do regional integration policies matter? Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment on heterogeneous green innovation

Lei Li, Shaojun Ma, Yilin Zheng, Xiaoyu Ma and Kaifeng Duan

Energy Economics, 2022, vol. 116, issue C

Abstract: In recent years, the governance crisis represented by air pollution, climate warming, and resource and environmental degradation has restricted the sustainable development of cities. Green innovation, characterized by low carbon intensity and efficiency, is an important way to solve the dilemma of resource constraints and ecosystem degradation. This paper constructs a quasi-natural experiment with China's regional integration policies as the shock, and studies the policy effects of heterogeneous green innovation from 2005 to 2019. The results show that: the impact of regional integration policies on total green innovation is dynamic and sustainable; regional integration policies can positively promote exploitative green innovation, but have no significant impact on exploratory green innovation; and the effects of regional integration policies on green innovation in cities of different sizes, locations, and pollution levels is heterogeneous. Future policy design should therefore pay more attention to the incentive effect of exploratory green innovation.

Keywords: Regional integration policies; Exploitative green innovation; Exploratory green innovation; Difference-in-differences method; Policy effect; Heterogeneity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O2 O3 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:eneeco:v:116:y:2022:i:c:s0140988322005552

DOI: 10.1016/j.eneco.2022.106426

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