ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Environ. Sci.
Sec. Environmental Economics and Management
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fenvs.2025.1556238
This article is part of the Research TopicEconomic visions to mitigate Climate ChangeView all 6 articles
Low-carbon pathways to digitalization: can the digital economy improve carbon efficiency?
Provisionally accepted
- 1Capital University of Economics and Business, Beijing, China
- 2Handan University, Handan, Hebei Province, China
- 3School of Environment, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, Beijing, China
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The present study investigates the impact of the digital economy on carbon emission efficiency in 282 prefecture-level cities in China from 2008 to 2020. The present study adopts a two-way fixed panel model, a moderated effects model, a CCR-SBM model and a spatial Durbin model. It is evident that a clear 'U' shaped relationship exists between the digital economy and carbon emission efficiency, as evidenced by a linear term coefficient of -0.320. Furthermore, the Dig data reveals a substantial inflection point at 2.62, thereby substantiating the existence of a discernible correlation between the digital economy and carbon emission efficiency. Following the execution of a series of robustness tests, including endogeneity tests and alternative model specifications, the model was found to demonstrate a consistent positive correlation. The findings of the mechanism test suggest that human capital strengthens the positive effect of the digital economy on carbon emission efficiency by accelerating the inflection point of the U-curve. Moreover, the digital economy has been demonstrated to enhance carbon emission efficiency through industrial structure transformation and marketisation. Heterogeneity analyses demonstrate that regional location, city size and characteristics exert an influence on this effect. The results of the study provide insights for the high-quality development of Chinese cities in a green and low-carbon manner.
Keywords: Carbon emission efficiency, CCR-SBM model, Human Capital, Spatial spillover, digital economy
Received: 09 Jan 2025; Accepted: 19 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 YUAN, ZHANG, LIU and LI. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Shuaifeng YUAN, Capital University of Economics and Business, Beijing, China
Shiliang LIU, School of Environment, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, 100875, Beijing, China
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