The Impact of Digital Economy of Resource-Based City on Carbon Emissions Trading by Blockchain Technology

The development of China’s manufacturing industry is constrained by factors such as energy and resources, and low-carbon development is arduous. Digitalization is an important method to transform and upgrade traditional industries. Based on the panel data of 13 manufacturing industries in China from 2007 to 2019, a regression model and a threshold model were used to empirically test the impact of digitalization and electricity consumption on carbon emissions. The research results were as follows: (1) The digitalization level of China’s manufacturing industry was steadily increasing; (2) The proportion of electricity consumption in China’s manufacturing industries in the total electricity consumption hardly changed from 2007 to 2019, basically maintaining at about 6.8%. The total power consumption increased by about 2.1 times. (3) From 2007 to 2019, the total carbon emissions of China’s manufacturing industry increased, but the carbon emissions of some manufacturing industries decreased. (4) There was an inverted U-shaped relationship between digitalization and carbon emissions, the higher the level of digitalization input, the greater the carbon emissions of the manufacturing industry. However, when digitalization develops to a certain extent, it will also suppress carbon emissions to a certain extent. (5) There was a significant positive correlation between electricity consumption and carbon emissions in the manufacturing industry. (6) There were double energy thresholds for the impact of labor-intensive and technology-intensive manufacturing digitalization on carbon emissions, but only a single economic threshold and scale threshold. There was a single scale threshold for capital-intensive manufacturing, and the value was −0.5352. This research provides possible countermeasures and policy recommendations for digitalization to empower the low-carbon development of China’s manufacturing industry.

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Digitalization, Electricity Consumption and Carbon Emissions—Evidence from Manufacturing Industries in China

Zhang

Wang

2023

“…Based on the previous section, we have learned that BC policy mainly reduces regional carbon emissions by improving the quality of regional innovation and promoting advanced industrial structures. To confirm the reliability of the theoretical analysis, this paper refers to the study of Akerman et al [42] and further adds the interaction terms of mediating variables and core explanatory variables in the baseline model (1) to construct the following four models to carry out the mechanism test.…”

Section: Intermediary Effect Testmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Moreover, "carbon peak" and "carbon neutral" targets have brought new opportunities for China's economy to shift to a high-quality and environmental-friendly development model, while also posing new challenges to the development efficiency and speed of China's economy. The traditional economy is gradually transforming into a DE, which will help China's cities' low-carbon urban transformation [1].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Can Digital Economy Development Contribute to the Low-Carbon Transition? Evidence from the City Level in China

Liu

Tian

et al. 2023

As a new engine to promote high-quality development and a sustainable economy, the digital economy (DE) plays a key role in achieving carbon reduction targets. In this paper, we use the “broadband China (BC)” policy as a proxy variable for the DE and employ the panel data of Chinese prefecture-level cities from 2006 to 2019 to investigate the effect of DE development on carbon emission intensity and its mechanism of action. It is found that (1) DE development significantly reduces the carbon emissions of cities and presents dynamic and sustainable characteristics; (2) the results of mechanism tests indicate that DE development is more inclined to reduce carbon emission intensity by improving regional innovation quality than by improving regional innovation quantity; (3) the impact of DE development on carbon emission intensity differs among cities with different characteristic attributes and different environmental regulation intensity, and the emission reduction effect is more obvious in non-resource-based cities, cities with lower environmental regulation intensity, and cities with weaker environmental target constraints; (4) the impact of DE development and innovation-driven development strategies on reducing carbon emission intensity has a policy linkage effect.

“…With the continuous development of human socioeconomic activities and urbanization, cities have become the most carbon-intensive areas. With its technological advantages, the DE provides technical support for the city to reduce CE by designing a scientific and reasonable trading mechanism and building a relevant trading platform [ 45 ]. In the process of economic development, the development of the DE will also adjust the level of innovation and industrial structure, etc., to make it develop in a low-carbon direction [ 33 ].…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Digital Economy and Environmental Quality: Insights from the Spatial Durbin Model

Wang

Sun

Zhang

et al. 2022

Recent developments in attaining carbon peaks and achieving carbon neutrality have had enormous effects on the world economy. Digitalization has been considered a viable way to curtail carbon emissions (CE) and promote sustainable economic development, but scant empirical studies investigate the link between digitalization and CE. In this context, this study constructs the digitalization index using the entropy value method and spatial Markov chain, and the spatial Durbin model is employed to analyze its impact mechanism and influence on urban CE in 265 prefecture-level cities and municipalities in China from 2011 to 2017. The results indicate that: (1) The overall development level of the digital economy (DE) posed a significant spatial effect on urban environmental pollution. However, the effect varies according to the different neighborhood backgrounds. (2) The DE impedes urban environmental deterioration directly and indirectly through the channels of industrial structure, inclusive finance, and urbanization. (3) The development of the DE significantly reduces pollution in cities belonging to urban agglomerations, while the development of the DE escalates emissions in nonurban agglomeration cities. Finally, based on the results, important policy implications are put forward to improve the environmental quality of cities.