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The mechanism of the environmental regulations affecting carbon emissions is complex, and for many years it has been a hot research topic for researchers. However, few of the previous studies have focused on whether or not environmental regulations can potentially influence carbon emissions through technical efficiency. Therefore, the present study chose to investigate the mediation effects of the technical efficiencies between environmental regulations and carbon emissions using the provincial panel data of energy-intensive industries for the period ranging from 2005 to 2015. The results were as follows: (i) In regard to the entire group of energy-intensive industries, it was found that environmental regulations could not only potentially directly reduce carbon emissions, but also indirectly reduce carbon emissions through technical efficiency. In other words, technical efficiency had played a partial mediation role between the environmental regulations and the carbon emissions; (ii) It was observed that for the different subdivided energy-intensive industries, the different levels of technical efficiency had shown various mediation effects. For example, the mediation effects of technical efficiency in the petroleum processing and coking (PPC) industry; papermaking and paper products (PPP) industry, and raw chemical materials and chemical products (RCMCP) industry, were found to be similar to those of the whole energy-intensive industries. Furthermore, the "Porter Hypothesis" had been verified in the nonmetal mineral products (NMP) industry. However, there were no mediation effects observed in the smelting and pressing of ferrous metals (SPFM) and smelting and pressing of nonferrous metals (SPNM) industries; (iii) In this study, in accordance with the regression results of the double-threshold models, it was found that for the energy-intensive industries as a whole, the carbon emission reduction effects of environmental regulations had become stronger with the increases in technical efficiency. For the PPP and RCMCP industries, there was an inverted U-shaped relationship observed between environmental regulations and carbon emissions when the technical efficiency was taken as the threshold variable. Therefore, based on the research conclusions achieved in this study, some policy recommendations were put forward. • Environmental regulation reduces carbon emission of the energy intensive industries of China. • Technical efficiency plays a partial mediation effect between environmental regulation and carbon emission. • The mediation effects of technical efficiency differ in the subdivided energy-intensive industries. • The "Porter hypothesis" is verified in Nonmetal Mineral Products (NMP) industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green technology is a crucial way to achieve energy conservation, emission reduction and economic growth. Most of the previous literature has studied the influence of green technology on carbon emission from the regional perspective. This paper discusses the direct role in terms of industry of seven green technologies under the International Patent Classification (IPC) Green Inventory classification standard on the reduction of carbon intensity and the indirect impact of technology vertical spillovers generated by transmission via the intermediate input products channel on carbon intensity. Based on empirical research that was conducted by adopting an improved regression on the population, affluence and technology (STIRPAT) model using the panel data of 17 categories of industries in China from 2000 to 2015, the indirect effect was more significant than the direct result, as every green technology innovation level and technology spillover capacity was increased by 1%, the carbon intensity reduced by 0.1303% and 0.1558%, respectively. Energy conservation technology played a direct role in the reduction of carbon intensity and achieved the best results, and its impact was 1.76 times that of waste management technology, which had the weakest effect. Transportation emission reduction technology played an indirect role in the reduction of carbon emission intensity and achieved the best results; its impact was 2.13 times the average value of all types of technology spillover effects. Finally, the paper analyzes seven types of green technology spillover capacities and the heterogeneity in the reduction of carbon intensity efficiency and provides some relevant policy suggestions. • The green technology has been examined from the industry perspective. • The green technology vertical spillovers can reduce the carbon intensity more significantly. • Distinguished seven types of green technology. • Discovered the key kinds of green technology. • Explored the heterogeneity of spillover capacity and their effects on carbon intensity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an important part of urban carbon emissions, the carbon emissions from household energy consumption are increasing with the continuous improvement of Chinese urbanization. This study divides family population into 4 groups: adolescents (aged 0–17), young people (aged 18–44), middle-aged people (aged 45–59), and elderly people (aged 60 and older) and develops a calculation model for carbon emissions of household energy consumption in accordance with the latest standards of the World Health Organization based on Chinese Family Panel Studies in 2016. Results showed that the marginal and intergenerational effects coexist in various types of household energy consumption: Families with 3–5 people have the most economical consumption scale and the largest marginal sharing effect; multigenerational families or families with a large proportion of middle-aged and older people are beneficial in reducing household energy consumption. This paper suggests it is important to fully consider the impact of the intergenerational effect, marginal effect, and cultural shock caused by the electronic information age on household energy consumption when formulating standards of household energy consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on panel data from 2007 to 2016, this paper investigates the carbon abatement effect of China's pilot Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) and the influencing paths of the policy at both national and regional level by using Difference in Differences model and parallel multiple mediator model. The results reveal that the policy has reduced the total carbon emission reduction by 13.39%, with an upward abatement trend annually. Secondly, a systematic framework containing technique effect, composition effect and allocation effect is proposed to further investigate the influencing mechanisms of the achieved emission curbing effect. It reflects that the policy has not yet promoted the low-carbon innovation completely, only innovation of high-quality played an effective mediating role. Meantime, two other influencing channels of industrial upgrading and optimized resource allocation are verified. Thirdly, policy's heterogeneous impacts are detected by classifying China into three representative regions according to economic and geographical differences, where western China experiences the strongest emission abatement by 21.57%, whereas central China and eastern China is 9.83% and 6.65% respectively. Fourthly, assessments of the regional influencing mechanisms show that the mediating role of high-quality low-carbon technology innovation is only significant in the western region, while the other two regions tend to have rebound effect. Besides, the promotion of industrial upgrading is positively related to the development levels of regions, with the improvement of 18.01% in the eastern region, followed by 17.34% and 12.46% in the central and western region. Finally, the optimization of the resource allocation has not been promoted regardless of the regions. In general, although the current policy has a significant carbon reduction effect, there is still much space for potential abatement to be developed. • China's pilot ETS has significant carbon reduction effects at both national and regional level. • Mediating effects of high-quality innovation, industrial upgrading and allocation optimization are significant nationally. • Only high-quality innovation is effective in western China, while other mediating roles are not significant regionally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

All industries produce different carbon emissions during their production process. Previous studies use multivariate regression or panel models to explore the impact of the industrial structure on regional carbon emissions differences based on time series data or panel data from the perspective of one-dimensional continuous variables. However, there are also regional differences in the factors affecting regional carbon emission differences, such as the economic development level, the industrial structure, and urbanization. The regional carbon emission difference matrix and the influencing factor difference matrix are relational variables, and it is difficult for traditional multiple regression analysis to study the relationship between relational variables. Thus, this paper proposes the perspective of two-dimensional difference relations for studying the influencing factors of regional carbon emission differences based on Quadratic Assignment Procedure model. Energy consumption and the value added by industrial processes in various industries from 30 regions in China are taken as the sample. The results of this study are as follows: carbon emissions are increasing and the differences in carbon emissions between regions are also increasing. There are obvious regional differences in the industrial structure, economic growth, population and urbanization in China. The influence and magnitude of the impact of regional industrial structure differences on regional carbon emission differences vary from year to year. Interregional differences in industry, construction and transportation and warehousing industries had a significantly positive impact on interregional differences in carbon emissions from 2007 to 2016. By analyzing the impact of the influence mechanism of regional industrial structure differences on carbon emissions, the findings of this study can identify some suggestions for regionally balanced emission reduction policies. • Regional industrial structural difference impact on carbon emission difference. • The relationship between difference matrices is analyzed based on QAP. • The factors affecting the difference in carbon emissions vary from year to year. • Heavy industry difference has the greatest impact on carbon emission. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an economic means to cope with climate change, carbon trading has become an important measure to reduce carbon emissions in China. It has been over seven years since the initiation of seven pilot carbon markets, but has the implementation achieved the goal of controlling carbon emissions in the region? Are the effects really resulted from the carbon market other than other energy-saving and emission reduction policies? Based on the provincial panel data of China from 2005 to 2016 this paper conducts an empirical study on the emission reduction effects of pilot projects using the Difference-in-differences model (DID). The results show that: (1) The implementation of carbon markets in Beijing, Shanghai and Hubei exhibited a significant inhibitory effect on local carbon emissions, but a promoting effect in Guangdong, and no significant effect was found in Tianjin; (2) In terms of time lag effect, no significant inhibiting effect on the local carbon emissions is found during the first year of opening of Shanghai carbon market but the effect grew significantly from 2015 to 2016; while for Hubei and Beijing, significant effect was shown from the first year of running. Being an experimental program to see whether the carbon trading policy would work in China or not and if it does, under what conditions and settings the policy becomes effective, the 7 pilot markets provide important experiences and lessons to the upcoming nationwide market in China. Based on the empirical result that the carbon trading system in Beijing, Shanghai and Hubei effectively reduced carbon emissions, it is suggested that the national carbon market should actively learn from the experiences of these three pilot markets particularly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]