Measurement And Interaction Mechanism Of Highway Transportation Efficiency And Environmental Regulation

Green development is the way to achieve sustainable development and is a full reflection of people’s desire to a better life.Environmental regulation is an important variable influencing green development.If it’s scientific and effective,a balance will be struck between environmental and economic benefits.An important part of the integrated transport system is highway transport.The level of highway transport’s development directly affects the entire transport sector and plays a pivotal role in the level and speed of economic and social development.Whether the mode of transport development and consumption can be transformed into a green transition is directly influenced by the environmental regulations in the highway transport sector.This paper first quantifies the effect of environmental regulations,then uses the SBMDEA model to measure highway transport efficiency in 31 Chinese provinces from 2008 to2017,and finally uses the PVAR model to investigate the interaction between highway transport efficiency and environmental regulations.The conclusions are as follows:1.From 2008 to 2017,the cost of pollution abatement in China showed a small fluctuation and an upward trend,with the distribution characteristic of "East > Midlands > West >Northeast";the overall pollution emission intensity in China showed a small fluctuation and a downward trend,with the distribution characteristic of " Midlands > East > Northeast > West"..From 2008 to 2017,China’s highway transport efficiency in general showed a trend of first tendency and then increase.Avoiding the influence of environmental and stochastic factors,the efficiency of the highway transport industry as a whole has improved,with the overall efficiency of highway transport and pure technical efficiency showing an " East > Midlands >West > Northeast " distribution,and the " Midlands > East > Northeast > West " distribution shows limescale efficiency.2.There is a two-way causal relationship between highway transport efficiency and pollution abatement costs,but there is a single causal relationship with pollution emission intensity.In the short term,the impact of government policy on highway transport efficiency is time-limited,but in the long term it does not promote sustainable growth in highway transport efficiency.3.Environmental regulations can make pollution control more costly for transport companies and more expensive to lead to a reduction in highway transport efficiency;they also have a catalytic effect on technological innovation,reducing the intensity of pollution emissions and increasing highway transport efficiency;at the same time,however,negative feedback from highway transport efficiency on environmental regulations can trigger new technological innovations and increases in highway transport efficiency.Therefore,governments must develop targeted and sound environmental regulatory policies to guide highway transport enterprises in their technological innovation.Enterprises should actively develop cleaner production technologies and green and intensive transport to achieve a win-win situation in which the highway transport industry flourishes and environmental quality improves.