Business School, Shandong University of Technology, Zibo 255000, China.
Fintech Innovation Center, Financial Intelligence & Financial Engineering Key Laboratory of Sichuan Province, China; School of Economic Information Engineering, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, Chengdu, China.
Sci Total Environ. 2022 Sep 10;838(Pt 3):156341. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.156341. Epub 2022 May 29.
Resource-based cities (RBCs) have made outstanding contributions to China's social and economic development over recent decades. Nevertheless, with the worsening climate change and the exhausted resources, how to curb carbon emissions of RBCs to deliver their low-carbon transformation is becoming a problem plaguing the world. To facilitate the low-carbon transformation of RBCs, the Chinese government has formulated many policies, including the Sustainable Development Policy of National Resource-based Cities, 2013-2020 (SDPRC). However, the implementation of SDPRC has not yielded a clear environmental influence. Therefore, this study employs the Propensity Score Matching-Difference in Difference to investigate this influence based on the panel data of 285 prefecture-level cities from 2006 to 2017 while exploring the related heterogeneity and impact mechanisms. It is found that: (1) the implementation of SDPRC has significantly reduced carbon emissions and intensities of RBCs, with this effect becoming more conspicuous with the advancement of the policy. A robust test also verifies these findings. (2) Results from the heterogeneity test demonstrate that the implementation of SDPRC has imposed a suppressive effect on CO emissions in eastern, central, and western Chinese regions, especially pronounced in the latter two regions. Except for the growing cities, which are not significantly affected by the policy, the other three types of cities have seen a catalytic effect on CO emission reduction from the implementation of the policy, with the most significant impact observed in the declining cities. (3) Analyses of related mechanisms reveal that thanks to the implementation of SDPRC, RBCs suppress CO emissions mainly by optimizing their industrial structures and relieving their energy intensities. Finally, some policy recommendations are proposed based on the findings of this study to facilitate the low-carbon transformation of RBCs.
资源型城市（RBCs）在过去几十年里为中国的社会和经济发展做出了杰出贡献。然而，随着气候变化的恶化和资源的枯竭，如何遏制 RBCs 的碳排放以实现其低碳转型已成为困扰全球的问题。为了促进 RBCs 的低碳转型，中国政府制定了许多政策，包括《全国资源型城市可持续发展规划（2013-2020 年）》（SDPRC）。然而，SDPRC 的实施并未产生明显的环境影响。因此，本研究采用倾向得分匹配-倍差法（PSM-DID），利用 2006 年至 2017 年 285 个地级市的面板数据，在探讨相关异质性和影响机制的基础上，考察了该政策的影响。研究结果表明：（1）SDPRC 的实施显著降低了 RBCs 的碳排放和强度，随着政策的推进，这种效应变得更加明显。稳健性检验也验证了这些发现。（2）异质性检验结果表明，SDPRC 的实施对中国东部、中部和西部地区的 CO 排放都产生了抑制作用，在中、西部地区尤为明显。除了增长型城市不受政策显著影响外，其他三种类型的城市都因政策的实施而对 CO 减排产生了催化作用，其中衰退型城市的影响最为显著。（3）相关机制分析表明，由于 SDPRC 的实施，RBCs 主要通过优化产业结构和缓解能源强度来抑制 CO 排放。最后，根据本研究的结果提出了一些政策建议，以促进 RBCs 的低碳转型。
