Search

As digital economy develops, its impact on green innovation and energy efficiency has become the focus of current research. To explore the impact of the current development of the digital economy on the energy industry, this paper selects the parameter of green innovation resilience, analyzes the impact mechanism of green innovation resilience on energy efficiency under the shock of digital economic development, and uses relevant data from 284 cities in China from 2011 to 2019 for empirical testing. It is found that: green innovation resilience promotes energy efficiency; low level of green innovation resilience inhibits the improvement of energy efficiency, while high level of resilience promotes energy efficiency; the initial stage of digital economic development generates resource grabbing and the effect of technological constraints, which weakens the role of green innovation resilience in promoting energy efficiency. The results indicate that the resilience of the green innovation system should be strengthened in order to fully tap the potential for promoting energy efficiency; the policy orientation of "digital greening—energy efficient" should be pursued in the development of digital economy; the rational allocation of resources and the implementation of green standards should be strengthened in the process of digital economic development; and the constraints on energy efficiency improvement in the early stage of digital economic development should be broken through by accelerating the digitalization process. • Green innovation resilience can promote energy efficiency. • Early digital economy development can lead to resource grabbing and technology constraints effects. • Pursuing the policy orientation of "digital greening—energy efficient". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on data of the manufacturing sector of China and Japan from 2003 to 2016, this paper attempts to measure the progresses in energy-biased technology and energy efficiency by constructing a threshold panel regression model with variables including foreign direct investment (FDI) and energy consumption structure to explain energy efficiency using energy-biased technology as the key explaining variable. The estimation indicates significant differences in the energy efficiency of China's and Japan's manufacturing industries. In general, Japan's total energy efficiency is higher than China's. The industry with more intensive technology has higher energy efficiency which rises much faster. The paper finds that the energy efficiency of China's manufacturing sector shows an upward trend in general, while Japan's fluctuates more, showing two peaks and two troughs. Our empirical results show that there is a threshold value of progress in energy-biased technology; below this, progress in energy-biased technology will have a positive effect on energy efficiency and beyond it, the effect will be negative. Since this effect is not one-way, we define it as a 'double-edged effect'. It is estimated that the level of energy-biased technology progress of most manufacturing industries in China is below the threshold value, indicating that the technology progress in China's manufacturing sector has not been excessively biased towards energy consumption, and the impact on energy efficiency is still positive. The China-Japan comparison shows that the threshold value for Japan's manufacturing sector is significantly lower than that for China's, indicating a marginal effect on the 'double-edged effect': The threshold value will decrease when energy efficiency reaches a certain level. Therefore, it is necessary to offset these negative externalities from technological progress with other factors such as by increasing FDI and improving energy consumption structure. • This paper examines the influence of energy-biased technological progress alone on energy efficiency. • It proves the influence of energy-biased technological progress on energy efficiency to be nonlinear. • It measures the energy-biased technological progress and energy efficiency of some industries of the manufacturing sector of China and Japan. • It proves the rebound effect to be conditional in the manufacturing sector of China and Japan. • It also proves the threshold effect in the influence of energy-biased technological progress on energy efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]