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The chemical oxygen demand (COD) emissions from the pulp and paper industry in China have declined continuously since the tighter COD discharge standards were implemented in 2008. Using firm-level data from 2003 to 2013, we investigate how China's pulp and paper firms would respond to the tighter COD discharge standards with a difference-in-differences design. We find that the tighter COD discharge standards have significant causal effects to induce the pulp and paper firms to reduce their COD emissions primarily through adopting cleaner production. However, the effectiveness of the tighter COD discharge standards depends on monitoring and enforcement activities as well as other regulations accompanying with the tighter COD discharge standards, all of which have become strengthened since China's 11th Five-Year-Plan (FYP, 2006–2010). While strengthened environmental regulations since the 11th FYP are from the top leadership of the Chinese government in order to deal with the increasing environmental degradation, the underlying driving force of the strengthened environmental regulations is from the household demand for better environmental quality as income increases. This study enriches literature not only on firms' responses to environmental regulations in developing countries but also on environmental regulations and technology adoption as well as environmental enforcement and compliance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between environmental regulation and firm productivity has been widely debated but inconsistencies in findings across different studies. Using detailed firm-level micro-data from 2000 to 2007, this paper employs difference-in-difference combined with matching based on entropy balancing method to explore the effect of environmental regulation on firm total factor productivity (TFP) in pulp and paper industry in China. Our main findings are as following: Firstly, stricter environmental regulation, as represented by the Wastewater Discharge Standards for Pulp and Paper Industry in Shandong province, increases firm TFP significantly. Moreover, the coefficients of interest are robust to multiple robustness checks. Secondly, dynamic effects estimates reveal that when faced with this phase-in environmental regulation, firms take the foreseeably increasing strictness into account from the very beginning and prefer to take one-step adjustment to reach full compliance. Thirdly, potential mechanism analysis finds that the positive effect mainly comes from the improvement of resource allocation efficiency within firms. Fourthly, the heterogeneity test indicates that the effect of environmental regulation on firm TFP is heterogeneous across firms with different sizes, ages, ownerships, capital intensity, and export status. Finally, this paper provides convincing and insightful evidence that environmental regulation has the potential to achieve the dual goals of environmental sustainability and economic growth and is thus of broader significance for understanding the enforcement of environmental regulation in developing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article tests the impact of state environmental regulatory stringency on firms' allocation of production across states using plant-level U.S. Census data for the paper industry during 1967–2012. We model firms' production shares in each state with a conditional logit specification, testing several measures of state regulatory stringency and controlling for other state characteristics. Firms with relatively low compliance rates are more likely to avoid stringent states compared to firms with the highest compliance rates. This is consistent with our theoretical model when firms' compliance decisions are affected more by differences across their costs, rather than their benefits, of compliance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of China Pulp & Paper is the property of China Pulp & Paper Magazines Publisher and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Effective biodiversity protection is generally associated with a strict rule of law and democratic participation in environmental decision making. Norway's exceptional ranking in terms of governance, however, has failed to be a predictor of effective biodiversity protection. Through a systematic review of the main regulatory frameworks relevant to protecting biodiversity in Norway, this article analyses the misconceptions, perverse incentives and institutional bottlenecks that lie at the centre of the problem. The analysis finds three overarching barriers that regulatory frameworks have created to the effective protection and promotion of biodiversity in Norway, namely, a governance system based on diffuse legal obligations and responsibilities, excessive trust in private operators and considerable discretion to local entities. Accordingly, this article proposes three enabling factors, and related reform suggestions, for mitigating such barriers and domesticating earth system governance in biodiversity matters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In July 2015, China's national legislature brought in prosecutor-led civil environmental public interest litigation ("EPIL") for thirteen selected provincial areas of the country. After a two-year legal experiment, this prosecutor-led civil EPIL system was then established nationwide in July 2017. Yet, can it be said that prosecutorial regulators in China are in fact a paper tiger? Drawing upon content analysis of the 655 prosecutor-led civil EPILs and in-depth interviews with twelve frontline prosecutors and judges, this article examines the dynamics of regulatory practice and the motivation of the Chinese prosecutorial organs to engage in environmental regulation through litigation. Based upon the above two legislative landmarks in the law reform of this area, the regulatory practice of prosecutorial organs can be viewed as having occurred in three stages, with each stage featuring a distinct regulatory model: ad hoc regulation through local innovation before July 2015, forced regulation during the legal experiment from July 2015 to July 2017, and perfunctory regulation after the nationwide establishment of the prosecutor-led civil EPIL system in July 2017. The data shows that the Chinese prosecutorial organs have engaged in a larger number of such lawsuits since the second stage, but they have shown a strong preference for cases with less complicated facts, weak and small defendants, and minor environmental violations. Three factors that influence regulatory motivation are employed to analyse the change in regulatory models: the ambiguity of the law, the top-down political pressure for regulation, and the cost of regulation. This study highlights the very limited effectiveness of vertical political pressure in boosting prosecutorial regulation and the strong impacts of the cost of regulation and the ambiguity of the law. In particular, the high cost of regulation that takes weak regulatory capacity, lack of regulatory autonomy, and the winning rate-oriented performance appraisal system into account have significantly weakened the motivation of prosecutorial organs to pursue civil EPIL. The findings of this study echo the conditions present in the successful prosecutorial regulations in Brazil and contribute to the scholarship about prosecutorial regulations in the field of environmental protection in the Global South. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The key objectives of coating papers and paperboards are to improve their aesthetic appearance and printability. Coatings offer smoothness, gloss, brightness, and opacity to the base papers and provide them with enhanced printability, which requires resistance to ink splitting forces, smoothness, ink holdout and gloss, etc. Styrene acrylate latexes were synthesized, via emulsion polymerization, and were formulated as coats for white and brown recycled papers. Both processes were characterized specifically for offset printing. The prepared latexes showed enhanced solid content, viscosity, zeta potential and appropriate glass transition temperature for paper coating formulation. The porosity, gloss and Cobb60 values of coated papers increased with the increased addition of nano-emulsion modified latexes. The formulations afforded high printability (print gloss and print density) with local ground calcium carbonate compared with that of the imported pigment (kaolin). Furthermore, the synthesized binder had higher water resistance than the commercial one; which can tightly be correlated with print quality, printability and productivity and most significantly, permits usage of low viscous ink. Coated recycled brown base gave promising results with respect to print quality although offset printing was utilized. The novelty of this work was not only in employing the local alternative binder and local pigment but also in achieving compatibility with environmental regulations since oil-based inks and recycled papers were also used. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a panel data set from 2007 to 2019, we empirically evaluate the impact of carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) technology innovation on green total factor productivity (GTFP). The findings show that (1) CCUS technology innovation significantly improves GTFP. (2) CCUS technology innovation significantly contributes to GTFP by promoting industrial structure upgrading and carbon emissions efficiency. (3) Environmental regulation plays a positive moderating role in the nexus between CCUS technology innovation and GTFP. The findings of this paper provide guidance for China to achieve green energy transition and build a green energy system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Guidelines on Building a Market-Oriented Green Technology Innovation System, which was released by China in 2019, has become a powerful signal to guide the development of green technology innovation (GTI). In the current digital strategy of China, the public media has become a key factor for promoting the transparency of enterprise environmental information. This paper measures the GTI efficiency of the listed paper enterprises in China as well as incorporating media attention into the research framework to explore the influencing factors of GTI of the listed paper enterprises in China during the digital economy era. The results showed that a positive media report had a positive impact on GTI and has become a new driving factor in promoting sustainable production in the digital era. Government support and openness also have a positive impact on GTI. However, negative media reports, environmental regulations, and technological innovation abilities have an inhibitory effect on the GTI efficiency of paper making enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Well-designed environmental regulations are a prerequisite for achieving green economic growth. However, the effectiveness of campaign-style environmental regulation—a widely used environmental management instrument in developing nations or even in some developed nations, on green economic growth remains under-researched and has not reached a consistent conclusion. This paper takes advantage of China's Central Environmental Protection Inspector policy—the strictest and largest campaign-style environmental regulation policy in China's history, as a natural experiment and uses the difference-in-differences method to explore the effect of campaign-style environmental regulation on green economic growth, and further analyze its underlying mechanisms and heterogeneity effects. The panel data covering 280 prefecture-level cities in China from 2009 to 2019 are used. Our results show that Central Environmental Protection Inspector can result in an average of 14.2% increase in green economic growth, and this effect is sustainable for a long time. Mechanism analysis shows that Central Environmental Protection Inspector boosts green economic growth mainly by promoting green innovation and optimizing industrial structure. Further heterogeneity analysis reveals that the positive effect of Central Environmental Protection Inspector on green economic growth is greater in eastern China and underdeveloped cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the impact of environmental stringency on the pattern of intra-industry trade (IIT) flows of four pollution-intensive industries, that is, pulp and waste paper, lime, cement, and construction materials, iron ore and concentrates, and dyeing and tanning extracts, by utilizing a balanced panel dataset comprising of 36 countries over the period 1990 to 2019. The environmental stringency variable has been estimated from the energy intensity of the trading countries. The results show that the environmental stringency coefficients are highly statistically significant, implying that environmental regulation emerges as an essential indicator of the IIT flows between two trading countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an important recyclable and reusable resource, waste paper is traded in millions of dollars around the world every year. Global waste paper trade not only addresses resource scarcity issues, alleviates environmental pressures and brings substantial economic gains, but also contributes to the development of global circular economy. Using complex network methods, bilateral waste paper trade data, and temporal exponential random graph models (TERGM), we construct global waste paper trade networks (GWPTNs) during 2000–2018, and examine their structural evolution and determinants. We report that: (I) GWPTNs display obvious features of small-world network, low reciprocity, heterogeneity and disassortativity; (II) Asia is the leading recipient of global waste paper, while Europe and North America are the main exporters; (III) China and India dominate the waste paper import markets while the United States is the largest exporter, and Germany plays an essential role in both importing and exporting hubs of waste paper; (IV) The evolution of the GWPTNs is significantly influenced by endogenous reciprocity, transitivity and preferential attachment, and economies with more partners or within the same continents are more likely to trade waste paper. Economies with higher urbanization rates, more per capita income, stricter environmental regulation, or lower industrialization rates are more likely to export waste paper; conversely, they are more likely to be the importers. Economy-pairs sharing a language or religion, being a former colony of the same colonizer, historical colonial relationship or a border, or signing regional trade agreements are more likely to trade waste paper. • Global waste paper trade networks (GWPTNs) in 2000–2018 are established. • GWPTNs show the features of small-world network, low reciprocity, heterogeneity and disassortativity. • Asia is the leading recipient, while Europe and North America are the main exporters. • China and India dominate import markets, and the US is the largest exporter. • Key factors influencing waste paper trade are revealed using the TERGM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aimed to analyze the association of environmental regulation with the adoption of both proactive and reactive eco-innovation strategies in the Brazilian pulp, paper, and paper product industry. Methodology was based on a quantitative approach, using a cross-sectional survey by means of a self-administered online questionnaire answered by 117 sector companies of all sizes and Brazilian regions. Data analysis consisted of inferential statistics with logistic regression analysis. The main results show that the organizations participating in this study consider environmental regulation as conducive of proactive, more than reactive, eco-innovation strategies, as opposed to previous literature. This result fits into the evolutionary perspective, which postulates that companies see environmental regulation as less a cost and more an opportunity, directing them to improve productivity and competitiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction of the sulfur emissions reduction directive for maritime transport has become a heavily debated policy issue in Northern Europe from the perspective of the future competitiveness of transport-dependent industries. The scientific value of this study is in its contribution to the scarce literature on the future of pulp and paper industry competitiveness from the tightening environmental regulation perspective, highlighting the complementary role of law-abiding and voluntary regulations. Using a Delphi-foresight method, the study evaluates the effectiveness of environmental regulation by identifying its positive and negative aspects for the future success of the pulp and paper industry, and uses the reduction of sulfur emissions as an example. From a business perspective, the panelists saw tightening regulation as both a threat and an opportunity, and stressed the role of the policy implementation in achieving actual environmental improvement. The strict regulatory measures were generally perceived as environmentally advantageous and more effective in the long term, but a rather divided view was seen in the ability of the sulfur emissions directive to effectively govern environmental sustainability. In discussion, the role of more voluntary alternatives to implementing command-and-control type policy measures is emphasized in complementing government legislation, to gain market benefits from greening the entire pulp and paper supply chain. To conclude, the development of sustainable transportation strategies has the potential to contribute toward long-term competitiveness in the pulp and paper industry, especially if new strategic innovation-oriented cross-sector partnerships develop in the production and use of transportation biofuels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

More attention has been paid to environmental regulation of greenhouse gas emissions in the energy industry under the transformation of industrial structure. This paper takes microdata of Chinese energy enterprises from 1998 to 2012 as a sample to build a duty-sharing model, analyzes the effect of environmental regulations on the industrial chain, and explains the "double growth" phenomenon that occurred in China, which is nothing short of miraculous in terms of the environment and economy. In the industrial chain, the environmental obligations and responsibilities will be shared between upstream and downstream enterprises due to trade linkages. This paper finds that environmental responsibilities will move forward through the industrial chain when environmental regulations are strengthened. Downstream companies will loosen "relative" control constraints, thereby expanding output but increasing demand for upstream products. Different from the existing research, we claim that, since environmental regulation has a differential effect on the industrial chain, it will promote the growth of output in the entire chain, in contrast to the theory of "cost compliance", which claims that environmental regulation will inevitably lead to the output. Based on this research, this paper puts forward some suggestions and insights on how the government implements environmental regulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corporate digital transformation and green transformation are the key paths to realizing China's high-quality development, and exploring how corporate digital transformation affects green innovation models holds both significant theoretical value and pragmatic enlightenment. By taking the A-share listed companies in China from 2002 to 2021 as research samples, this paper distinguishes between energy conservation and environmental protection green innovation models based on the IPC Green Inventory and the content of green innovation. This paper empirically examines the influence of corporate digital transformation on the green innovation model selection and its mechanism. The study finds that corporate digital transformation strongly motivates enterprises to select green innovation model, a role that stems from the utilization of digital underlying technologies. The research and development investment of digital greenization plays a mediating role in this process. Market competition, informal environmental regulations and government innovation subsidies can moderate enterprises' strategies for selecting green innovation models. Further heterogeneity analysis reveals that digital transformation drives corporate selection of energy-saving green innovation to a greater extent in industries that have a greater need for green transformation, such as the manufacturing industry. The results of this paper identify the effect of corporate digital transformation on green innovation model selection at the theoretical level and provide important insights into the coordinated development of Chinese corporate digitalization and greenization at the practical level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides novel empirical insights into the Porter hypothesis (PH) and its dynamic nature. The PH posits that well-designed environmental regulations induce eco-innovations at polluting firms that improve both their environmental and business performance via 'innovation offsets.' We conduct an econometric test of this proposition, using Swedish pulp and paper plants as empirical application. Swedish environmental regulation of polluting industries provides an interesting case because it has been praised, due to containing elements of 'well-designed' regulations, for being conducive to accomplishing the 'win-win' situation of mutual environmental and economic benefits. The empirical results indicate that flexible and dynamic command-and-control regulation and economic incentive instruments have induced innovation offsets through improved energy efficiency. Our study bears important implications: empirical tests of the PH that do not account for its dynamic nature, and that do not measure 'well-designed' regulations, might provide misleading conclusions as to its validity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the framework provided by the Porter hypothesis, we study the impact of environmental regulations and enforcement policies on plant‐level green total factor productivity (TFP) growth and its components related to efficiency change and technical change. The detailed microdata we use are from Sweden and for the pulp and paper industry. This industry is the source of significant amounts of water and air pollution and is one of the most heavily environmentally regulated manufacturing industries. Sweden has a unique decentralized regulatory structure where the manufacturing plants have to comply with plant‐specific regulatory standards stipulated at the national level, as well as decentralized local supervision and enforcement. Our empirical results point to beneficial impacts of the environmental policies on plants' green TFP growth and sustainable production practices. We also find that political economy considerations are important, as the presence of the Green Party and aspects like plant size (with corresponding local and regional economic effects) matter in enforcement of the standards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of bank digitalization construction, this paper explores the impact and mechanism of bank digital transformation on corporate green innovation based on the data of listed enterprises from 2010 to 2021. It is found that bank digital transformation enhances the overall and strategic nature of corporate green innovation but has no significant impact on corporate substantive green innovation. The mechanism analysis shows that bank digital transformation can promote corporate green innovation by inhibiting corporate financialization and alleviating corporate financing constraints. Government environmental regulation and media attention have a positive moderating effect on the relationship between banks' digital transformation, and enterprises' green innovation, i.e., an increase in the level of government environmental regulation and an increase in media attention will strengthen the promotion effect of banks' digital transformation on enterprises' green innovation. Heterogeneity analysis shows that the promotion effect of banks' digital transformation on corporate green innovation is more significant for state- owned enterprises, heavily polluted enterprises, large-scale enterprises, and enterprises in the eastern region. Therefore, the digital transformation of banks can "empower" the green innovation of enterprises, help the green development of enterprises, and lead the high-quality development of the economy. At the same time, the study's results also show that the green development of enterprises should not be "superficial" but "substantial." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently, digital transformation is having various impacts on enterprises around the world, including the green innovation. However, the current literature on the relationship between digitalization and green innovation in enterprises is scarce. What is the relationship between them, and whether heterogeneous environmental regulation has mediating effects, are questions that are worth exploring. Using a sample of listed manufacturing enterprises in China, this paper empirically tests the impact of digital transformation on enterprise green innovation. The results show that: (1) Digital transformation has a significant positive impact on green innovation, including green innovation output and green innovation capability. (2) Diverse environmental regulation may have mediating effects of digital transformation's influence on green innovation. (3) After a number of robustness tests, the conclusions are still valid. This paper can provide a reference for developing green development strategies for manufacturing enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses an SBM-GML index model to assess Green Total Factor Productivity (GTFP) in China’s carbon-intensive sectors and conducts an empirical investigation into which factors influence GTFP in these sectors. The GTFP in the carbon-intensive sectors experienced a decline between 2006 and 2011, followed by an upward trend beginning in 2012. Technological progress was the primary driver of GTFP growth, while business size was also a notable contributor. Irrational energy structures negatively influenced the high-quality development of the carbon-intensive sectors, and environmental regulation and foreign direct investment (FDI) have not yet significantly impacted GTFP. Based on these findings, this paper suggests that the carbon-intensive sectors should expedite their green transitions by focusing on system improvement, technological innovations, energy revolutions, and high-level opening up. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Environmental pollution and energy poverty have always been serious challenges for the global energy system. Results: Based on the panel data of 30 provinces in China from 2005 to 2020, this paper uses FE and sys-GMM models to explore the impact of environmental regulations and climate change on energy poverty. The results show that climate change increases energy poverty, with rising energy for cooling in hot summers, and unchanged income in the short term. Moreover, environmental regulation plays a moderating role between climate change and energy poverty. Specifically, economical environmental regulation has a negative moderating effect, while legal and supervised environmental regulations have positive moderating effects. Finally, the national basic energy poverty line used is lower than that in the eastern region, higher than that in the western region, and close to that in the central region, which reflects the heterogeneity of energy poverty in different regions of China. Conclusions: The findings in this paper clarify the nexus between climate change, environmental regulation, and energy poverty, addressing in this way a gap in existing research, which has great significance for environmental and energy policy makers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of environmental regulations in the cities where enterprises are located on the technological complexity of exports from Chinese manufacturing companies. Currently, China is promoting high-quality development in foreign trade, which encompasses various aspects, including the enhancement of the technological content of export products. This study begins by examining the environmental regulations in the cities of enterprises and their effects on the technological content of exported products. It utilizes government work reports from various cities in China to evaluate the strength of environmental regulations in each city, subsequently analyzing their impact on the export technological complexity of Chinese manufacturing enterprises. Empirical results indicate that environmental regulations drive an increase in the technological complexity of exports from these enterprises, and this conclusion is validated through several robustness tests, including substitution variables and instrumental variable regression. Heterogeneity tests reveal that the effect of environmental regulations on export technological complexity is not significant for enterprises located in central cities compared to those in eastern and western cities. Furthermore, the export technological complexity of processing-trade enterprises and capital-intensive industries is not significantly influenced by environmental regulations. Additionally, the analysis of the moderating effect finds that a city's innovation capacity plays a reinforcing role in the relationship between environmental regulations and the export technological complexity of enterprises. Based on these research findings, this paper offers corresponding recommendations from the perspective of environmental regulations to promote the high-quality development of China's foreign trade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Actualidad Jurídica Ambiental is the property of CIEMAT, through its Centro Internacional de Estudios de Derecho Ambiental (CIEDA) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Although the dioxin alarm broke at the same time in Sweden and the US in the mid-1980s, Swedish pulp and paper (P&P) firms led the way towards the new market for low-chlorine and chlorine-free P&P products. This study explores the transition in the Swedish P&P industry and contrasts the Swedish case to the US experience. We highlight the importance of already established technological paths to deal with pollution, paths which were strongly formed by the different national environmental policies since the 1970s. Thus while US P&P firms were technologically locked-in when the dioxin alarm broke, the strategy of Swedish P&P firms to proactively collaborate in environmental research and development (R&D) together with a national policy that favoured process integrated abatement technology, helped Swedish firms take technological leadership. This article particularly stresses the implications of technological path-dependency and different national regulatory styles in understanding the evolution of different modes of corporate environmental strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In light of China's implementation of the Environmental Protection Tax Law (EPT Law) on 1 January 2018, this paper empirically investigates the influence of environmental regulations on the investment behaviour of heavily polluting firms using a difference-in-differences (DID) model. The EPT Law is found to improve the investment efficiency of heavily polluting firms by restraining overinvestment, an effect that applies mainly to private firms, particularly those with no political affiliations. This paper enriches the existing research on the economic consequences of the EPT Law by integrating environmental regulations, property rights, political affiliation and investment efficiency into a unified framework. This study's findings are instructive for understanding the economic effects of environmental regulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper investigates the capacity of environmental regulatory policies to effectuate carbon emission reduction (CER) at the enterprise micro-level. It delves into the intrinsic correlation between these policies through theoretical analysis and empirical assessments, scrutinising the varied effects of heterogeneous environmental regulations (ERs) such as sewage charges and environmental protection subsidies. Findings reveal that diverse ERs can bolster CER, with sewage charging ERs manifesting a more conspicuous emission reduction effect. Rigorous robustness tests validate these initial conclusions. Moreover, distinct ERs exhibit temporal lags in their impact on CER; sewage charging ERs display a diminishing trend in emission reduction efficacy, while environmental subsidies ERs exhibit dynamic superposition traits. Importantly, incentives for green innovation and enhancements in total factor productivity emerge as pivotal mechanisms by which diverse ERs propel CER within enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The government's environmental protection policy can significantly contribute to alleviating resource shortages and curbing environmental pollution, but the impact of various policy instruments implemented by the government on energy efficiency is unclear. Based on the panel data of 30 provinces in China from 2005 to 2021, this paper analyses the impact of environmental regulation and the industrial structure on energy efficiency from the perspective of resource taxes. The U-shaped relationship between environmental regulation and energy efficiency and between the optimization of industrial structure can significantly improve energy efficiency, and the optimization of industrial structure is conducive to weakening the initial inhibitory effect of environmental regulation. In addition, the analysis of regional heterogeneity showed that the impact of environmental regulation was stronger in the central and western regions, while the impact of industrial structure was stronger in the eastern and western regions. The conclusions of this study can help to expand the understanding of the relationship between environmental regulation and industrial structure on energy efficiency, provide policy enlightenment for the realization of green development and high-quality development, and provide Chinese examples and experiences for developing countries to improve energy efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although concerns about the environment have been raised by some governments and the public in general, literature has explored the possibility that Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) may flow from countries with strict environmental regulations to countries where the regulations are less stringent—the pollution haven hypothesis (PHH). In response to that tendency, some countries may implement less stringent regulations, in order to attract FDI, resulting in the race to the bottom effect (RTB). As the number of studies on this topic has expanded dramatically in the last two decades, the present work intends to provide an updated literature review on the relationship between FDI and environmental regulations. Through a bibliometric analysis, we evaluate the relevance of existing studies and identify possible trends. Results show that there is considerable empirical evidence for the PHH, but fewer studies confirm the RTB, and that topic has been increasingly analysed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's rapid economic development has attracted worldwide attention, but the resulting environmental problems also cannot be ignored. Whether environmental regulations can achieve a win–win situation between "green" and "economic growth" has become the focus of academic circles. While related studies have examined environmental regulation through the "Cost-following theory" and "Porter hypothesis", they have mostly focused on a particular region or province, thus neglecting the spatial effects. The spatial effects of environmental regulation are important to study because of the overall environmental correlation across regions and especially adjacent provinces. This paper extends the "cost-following theory" and the "Porter hypothesis" to the spatial perspective and proposes two hypotheses, respectively. Through the spatial expansion of environmental regulation theory, this paper not only analyses the direct effect of local environmental regulation on local economic growth, but also the spatial spillover effect of adjacent provinces' environmental regulation on local economic growth. The empirical results show that the relationship between environmental regulation and economic growth in China is consistent with the spatial perspective of "Cost-following theory", but not with the spatial perspective of "Porter hypothesis". Through the above analysis, this paper is able to address the issues of how to make environmental regulation policies in adjacent provinces or regions as a whole, and how to coordinate environmental regulation with economic growth in adjacent regions. The findings of this paper also suggest that spatial effects need to be sufficiently considered in future studies on environment-related issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The green transformation of heavy-polluting enterprises under the carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals needs the escort of command environmental regulation. This paper takes the first round of Central Environmental Protection Inspection as a natural experiment, reflecting the degree of green transformation through the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) level of enterprises. Taking Chinese A-share listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen from 2010 to 2022 as the research object, a dual machine learning model is used to determine whether this system can improve the ESG level of enterprises and promote their green transformation. Using a dual machine learning model, it is found that the system can enhance the ESG level of enterprises and promote their green transformation. Mechanism analyses show that the system promotes green transformation by enhancing green innovation capability, safeguarding the rights and interests of upstream and downstream supply chain actors, and enhancing governance diligence, thus encouraging enterprises to assume environmental, social, and governance responsibilities. It is also found that at the macro-policy level, with the migration of the inspection area to the west and the strengthening of local environmental governance, and at the micro-firm level, the higher the degree of digitization and the larger the size of assets, the deeper the system effect on the green transformation of heavy-polluting enterprises. It is further found that the spillover effect of green transformation within industries strengthens the positive effect of the Central Environmental Protection Inspection on the green transformation of enterprises compared to the interindustry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Resources Development & Market is the property of Sichuan Resource Development & Market Magazine Co., Ltd and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Background: Green development, which is crucial because of the escalating ecological and environmental issues, is largely driven by industrial transformation and environmental legislation. Purpose: The paper aims to examine the combined effects of environmental regulations and industrial change on the green economy, based on their separate effects. Methods: We use a fixed-effects regression on panel data covering 30 provinces in China in 2010-2020. Results: We reach the following conclusions: environmental regulations and rationalization of the industrial structure both support growth in the green economy, but advancement in the industrial structure hinders it. The combined effect of environmental regulations and advancement and rationalization in the industrial structure has a significantly positive impact on growth in the green economy; it is most pronounced in regions with higher resource endowments and economic development. Discussion: By providing specific empirical facts, this study clarifies the effects of industrial transformation and environmental regulations on growth in the green economy, contributing to enriching the literature and helping to pave the way to sustainable development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the increasingly prominent environmental issues in China, the government and citizens alike have intensified their focus on corporate investments in green environmental protection. Nevertheless, as government regulations become more stringent, there is substantial debate over whether environmental regulatory policies can consistently encourage listed companies to increase green environmental investments. Simultaneously, independent board supervision plays a crucial role in promoting the compliance and sustainability of listed companies regarding environmental protection. This paper selected a sample of 246 Chinese listed companies from 2010 to 2019, and used a fixed effects model to examine the impact of environmental regulation on the environmental investment of listed companies in China. Moreover, we used a mediation effect model to analyze the role of independent director supervision in influencing the relationship between environmental regulation and companies' green environmental investment. Additionally, we discuss the heterogeneous impact of environmental regulations on corporate environmental investments. Our findings are as follows: first, during the sample period, the tightening of environmental regulations significantly reduces the growth of environmental investment among the studied firms. As government environmental regulatory policies gradually intensify, the negative impact on environmental investments by listed companies becomes increasingly evident. Second, independent directors help alleviate the adverse impacts of environmental regulations on the environmental investment levels of listed companies. This suggests that the inclusion of independent directors in board governance plays a role in assessing government environmental regulatory policies and overseeing corporate decisions related to environmental investment. Lastly, the heterogeneity analysis indicates that environmental regulation significantly negatively impacts the environmental investment of listed companies in pollution-intensive industries and those located in the western regions. Furthermore, environmental regulatory policies impose greater constraints on the environmental investments of smallsized listed companies compared to their large-sized counterparts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China is at a critical moment of transforming high-speed development to high-quality development, and it is significant to improve the efficiency of green technological innovation. In this paper, under the perspective of two-stage innovation value chain, we construct the evaluation index system of green technology innovation efficiency, adopt the super efficiency SBM model to measure the green technology innovation efficiency of China's high-tech industries, and based on the results obtained, we assume the fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis method (fs-QCA) based on the group theory to explore the complex causal mechanism and grouping paths of the interaction between enterprises, government and market that affects the green technology innovation efficiency Mechanism and group path. The study results show that (1) enterprise, government, and market are not necessary conditions to influence the efficiency of green technological innovation, and even if a particular party plays a central role, it needs the assistance of other parties. (2) The improvement of green technological innovation efficiency requires the interaction of enterprises, government, and market, and even if any party does not have the core conditions, it can still produce high green technological innovation efficiency. (3) The path of the "innovative compensation" effect is identified, which indicates that enterprises will generate a high level of green innovation efficiency under sufficient investment brought about by the enterprise scale effect and matched with a good level of economic development. (4) The market economy-led pathway suggests that when the market economy is highly developed, firms do not need environmental regulation and government support to generate efficient levels of green technological innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Reducing carbon emissions from agriculture is essential to ensuring food security and human prosperity. As a country with approximately 20% of the global population, China has begun actively practicing the lowcarbon agricultural development conception. Against the backdrop of disruptive technologies that continue to be integrated into various industries, the massive application of agricultural robots has opened the way to intelligent agriculture. This paper tries to answer whether there is some non-linear nexus between the application of agricultural robots and agricultural carbon emissions in China. As an essential tool for carbon emission reduction in China, does environmental regulation moderate the nexus between agricultural robot applications and agricultural carbon emissions? If so, how does this effect manifest itself? Methods: This work takes China as an example by collecting macro-regional panel data from 30 provinces from 2006 to 2019. The environmental Kuznets curve theory is extended to agricultural carbon emissions, and we carried out empirical tests utilizing the panel fixed effects model and the moderating effects model. Results: This study verifies the inverted U-shaped nexus between agricultural robotics applications and agricultural carbon emissions in Chinese provinces, i.e., the agricultural carbon emissions (ACE)-Kuznets curve holds. The higher the level of formal environmental regulation, the larger the peak of the ACE-Kuznets curve and the more the inflection point is pushed back. The higher the level of informal environmental regulation, the lower the peak of the ACE-Kuznets curve and the later the inflection point. Discussion: The findings in this paper represent the first exploration of the environmental Kuznets curve in agricultural carbon emissions. It is noteworthy that the moderating effect of formal environmental regulation does not lower the peak of the curve as we expect. This appearance is attributed to the reality that China is still in a phase of rising agricultural carbon emissions, which is exacerbated by the overlapping positive effects of agricultural robotics applications and formal environmental regulations. Informal environmental regulation is more effective than formal environmental regulation in reducing agricultural carbon emissions at this stage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses the panel data of 275 prefecture-level cities in China in 2003–2019 and spatial Durbin model to verify the impact of environmental regulation and industrial agglomeration on air pollution. This paper finds that the enforcement intensity of environmental regulations (ER) is not consistent among cities. The effects of strict ER on air pollution in local city are the inverted-U-shape curve. The effects of more stringent ER in adjacent cities j on air pollution in city i are the U-shape curve. The more stringent ER in local city may lead to the decrease in agglomeration of manufacturing sectors (AM), thereby reducing air pollution. The polluting firms may shift production from neighboring cities j with stringent ER to city i with lax ER, thereby leading to the increase in AM, which aggravate air pollution in city i. The more stringent ER in local city i may lead to the increase in agglomeration of productive service industry (AS), thereby reducing air pollution. To avoid the transfer of polluting industrial sectors, the paper suggests that the more stringent implementation of ER should become nationwide actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Improving green innovation efficiency (GIE) is the key to achieve high-quality economic development in China, and the introduction of foreign direct investment (FDI) has become an important path choice to promote the GIE. Based on the data of 30 provinces in China, this paper explores the linear and nonlinear effects of FDI on GIE from both quantity and quality perspectives, and further analyzes the mediating role of environmental regulation level. The results show that: (1) From 2011 to 2020, the GIE of all provinces in China generally shows an upward trend. (2) The quantity and quality of FDI have a significant positive impact on the improvement of GIE in China's provinces, and this impact has regional heterogeneity. (3) The quantity and quality of FDI can promote the improvement of GIE in China through the level of environmental regulation (ER). (4) With the level of knowledge accumulation and GIE as the threshold variables, the quantity and quality of FDI have a single threshold effect on the GIE of China's provinces. The conclusions of this study provide some policy implications for local governments to make full use of FDI to perform green innovation activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In light of the implementation of the Environmental Protection Tax Law (the EPT Law) in China on 1 January 2018, this paper employs the difference-in-difference model (DID) to empirically investigates how the environmental regulations affects the green transformation of highly polluting firms. The results indicate that the EPT Law has significantly aided in the green transformation of highly polluting firms, with the increasing pressure of environmental legality acting as a partial mediating effect. This paper adds to the research on the economic effects of the environmental regulations and provides new evidence to support the incentive perspective on environmental regulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aimed to analyze the association of environmental regulation with the adoption of both proactive and reactive eco-innovation strategies in the Brazilian pulp, paper, and paper product industry. Methodology was based on a quantitative approach, using a cross-sectional survey by means of a self-administered online questionnaire answered by 117 sector companies of all sizes and Brazilian regions. Data analysis consisted of inferential statistics with logistic regression analysis. The main results show that the organizations participating in this study consider environmental regulation as conducive of proactive, more than reactive, eco-innovation strategies, as opposed to previous literature. This result fits into the evolutionary perspective, which postulates that companies see environmental regulation as less a cost and more an opportunity, directing them to improve productivity and competitiveness.

Based on measuring the green transformation of heavily polluting enterprises based on the sub-dimensions of green strategy and green action, we empirically analyze whether and how bank digitization affects the green transformation of enterprises by using the data of China's A-share heavily polluting enterprises from 2010 to 2021. The findings show that 1) bank digitization has a significant positive effect on firms' green transformation; 2) bank digitization promotes firms' green transformation by alleviating firms' financing constraints and improving firms' ESG performance; 3) governmental environmental regulations and media attention positively moderates the relationship between bank digitization and firms' green transformation; and 4) bank digitization is more likely to promote the green transformation of firms that are highly digitized, non-state-owned firms, and enterprises in the eastern region; 5) the sub-dimension test shows that bank digitization has significant differences on different dimensions of green transformation. The above analysis shows that bank digitization should be deeply integrated with the green transformation of enterprises, and the former should be deeply embedded in supervising, forcing and empowering enterprises to upgrade environmental protection technology and sewage treatment, and the regulator should formulate a more detailed environmental protection disclosure program to realize the consistency "words" and "deeds" of the green transformation of enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Amidst growing environmental challenges linked to coal dependence, fostering green innovation in new energy enterprises is vital for sustainable development in China. Although there have been studies on green innovation of new energy enterprises in recent years, few studies have been conducted from the perspective of ESG, whether informal environmental regulation represented by ESG can stimulate the green innovation of new energy enterprises is of great significance to China's construction of a low-carbon and secure energy system. In this paper, from the perspective of informal environmental regulation, based on the ESG ratings of SynTaoGreen Finance's first public newenergy listed companies as an exogenous shock, and taking A-share new energy listed companies as a sample from 2010 to 2021, we empirically verified the effect and mechanism of ESG ratings on the green innovation of new energy companies in terms of the quantity and quality of green innovations by utilizing the Staggered Difference-indifference (DID) model. The findings demonstrate that new energy enterprises' green patent numbers and quality are greatly enhanced by ESG grading. However, there is clear heterogeneity in this green innovation effect, which is particularly visible in new energy firms with state-owned enterprise and greater enterprise scales and a higher level of digitization. The Mechanistic findings suggest that ESG ratings drive green innovation by alleviating financial constraints, reducing agency risk, and boosting R&D, thus providing empirical evidence for the development of a green innovation ecosystem in the new energy industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]