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Green technology innovation plays an important role in achieving high-quality economic development in China. It is of great theoretical value and practical significance to study the effect of the Energy-consuming Right Trading Policy (ERTP) on green technology innovation. Based on the panel data of 279 cities in China from 2006 to 2020, this paper analyzes the effect of the ERTR on urban green technology innovation capacity (GTIC) by using the difference-in-differences (DID) model. The study shows that the ERTR can significantly improve urban GTIC and validates the “Weak Porter Hypothesis”. After a series of robustness tests, this conclusion still holds. Furthermore, the mechanism analysis shows that the ERTP can promote urban GTIC through industrial structure upgrading. In addition, the heterogeneity analysis indicates that the ERTR can significantly improve the GTIC of eastern cities and non-resource cities. This paper fills the gap of related studies and provides an important reference for improving the ERTP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading have become two strategic initiatives to realize a green economic development in the new development model of China. Exploring the relationship between green economic efficiency and the coupling degree of technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading is essential to achieve the visionary goal of green economic development and socialist modernization. This paper measures the coupling degree of technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading, classifies the coupling types based on the panel data of 30 provinces in China from 2012-2019, and measures the green economic efficiency of 30 provinces in China using the super-efficient model (SBM), based on a spatial econometric model to study the relationship between green economic efficiency and the coupling degree of technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading. The research results show that there is a significant positive effect on green economic efficiency among regions; the coupling degree of technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading has a significant direct effect and a spatial spillover effect on green economic efficiency, the spatial spillover effect plays a major role. The heterogeneity analysis reveals that in the regions with higher development and coordination degrees of technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading, the coupling degree of technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading has a significant effect on the green economic efficiency of the region, and in the regions with lower development and coordination degrees of technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading, the coupling degree of technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading has a significant positive effect on the green economic efficiency of the region and neighboring areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rapid development of digital finance has delivered significant benefits, such as sustainable development and economic growth. We explore the relationship between digital finance and green total factor energy efficiency (GTFEE) for the first time, filling a gap in the existing literature. This paper uses dynamic panel models to explore digital finance's impact on GTFEE at the Chinese city-level panel data from 2011 to 2018. The results show that digital finance can significantly improve urban GTFEE, and the findings remain robust with various tests. Second, the mechanism analysis indicates that digital finance can improve GTFEE by promoting urban green technology innovation and industrial structure upgrading. Further study shows that digital finance has a better effect on the improvement of GTFEE in central and western cities, small cities and non-resource-based cities, but has no significant or small impact on GTFEE in eastern cities, large cities and resource-based cities, reflecting the inclusiveness of digital finance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]