Do Environmental Regulations Promote China’s Green Development Efficiency?

Over the past 40 years of reform and opening up,the economic development model characterized by extensiveness has paid a huge resource and environmental price,and brought a series of serious ecological and environmental problems such as smog,acid rain,water pollution and resource shortage.Since the Third Plenary Session of the 18 th CPC Central Committee and the 19 th National Congress of the Communist Party of China,the concept of green development has been clarified and the construction of a green development economic system has been accelerated.The aim is to promote energy conservation,emission reduction and pollution reduction through environmental regulation and green technology innovation,which provides the possibility of sustainable economic and environmental development,and also provides a path for the continuous improvement of green development efficiency.Therefore,exploring the dynamic mechanism of promoting green development efficiency in China through environmental regulation and green technology innovation has certain theoretical and practical value.Based on relevant mature theories such as innovation theory and Porter hypothesis,this paper selects 30 provinces,municipalities and autonomous regions in mainland China from2003 to 2017 as research samples.First,the super-efficiency SBM-DDF model was used to measure the efficiency of provincial green development in China,and the trend and spatial distribution of China’s green development efficiency were analyzed.Second,the panel fixed effect model was used to study the impact of environmental regulations on green technology innovation.And the heterogeneity of time,the direct impact of environmental regulations on the efficiency of green development and the indirect impact of green technological innovation,and the spatial heterogeneity was discussed.Finally,the panel threshold model was used to explore the intensity of environmental regulations and the differences in regional characteristics.Threshold effect of environmental regulation on green development,multidimensional characterization of the mechanism of environmental regulation on green development.The main conclusions are as follows:(1)China ’s green development efficiency has generally maintained an upward trend from 2003 to 2017,and its spatial distribution shows the distribution characteristics of “the rise of the strong in the east and the weak in the west”;(2)command and control and public participation in environmental regulation cannot To promote green technology innovation,only market-inspired environmental regulation has a positive and significant impact on regional green technology innovation;(3)Environmental regulation has no direct impact on green development efficiency,and the indirect impact through green technology innovation is very significant.The impact of environmental regulation on the efficiency of green development is heterogeneity of environmental regulation tools and spatial heterogeneity;(4)The threshold regression results of environmental regulation support the "strong version" of the "Porter hypothesis",that is,strict and appropriate environmental regulation can Promote the progress of green development efficiency;(5)The effect of environmental regulation on green development efficiency is also affected by the regional characteristics of economic development level,energy consumption intensity,and industrial structure.