1. Introduction
Issues such as global warming caused by carbon emissions have gradually attracted widespread attention from the international community in the new era. Although global carbon emissions have experienced a short-term decline due to the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic [
1], the urgency and importance of addressing the challenge of climate change have not changed. According to “WMO Provisional State of the Global Climate 2022”, the latest report issued by The World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the global mean temperature in 2022 is currently estimated to be 1.15 ± 0.13 °C above the 1850–1900 average. The eight years 2015 to 2022 are likely to be the eight warmest years on record, with 2022 most likely to be 5th or 6th warmest. To control rising temperature and carbon dioxide concentration, greenhouse gas emissions must be reduced immediately, rapidly, and on a large scale. At the same time, the current global climate governance model has shown a state of governance failure, disorder, and ineffectiveness under the “anti-globalization” trend. The original climate cooperation process and the international climate order have been disrupted, so a transformation is urgently needed.
As the world’s largest developing country, China is in a critical period of modernization and faces more severe challenges in coordinating economic growth and reducing carbon emissions. With financial and social development, increasing urbanization rate, continuous population growth, and rapid growth of total energy consumption, environmental disasters, resource shortages, climate change, and other issues have become increasingly prominent, and China’s carbon emissions have risen rapidly in the past two decades. In 1997, China’s total carbon emissions were 3.308 billion tons. In 2007, China’s total carbon dioxide emissions surpassed that of the United States and ranked first in the world. Countries whose share of carbon emissions is still growing among the major countries in the world. However, China has always actively assumed the international responsibility of reducing carbon emissions, pursued a favorable global governance policy against the background of anti-globalization, closely combined the transformation of domestic development mode with global climate governance, and actively participated in and made significant contributions to the change of global climate governance, a key hub and a leading role in the future, and continuously improve the degree of nationally determined contributions. The 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed to build a new system of green and low-carbon modern industrial development in China. In 2020, China announced the “30·60” dual-carbon goals and successively released vital areas and industries’ carbon peak implementation plans and a series of supporting and safeguard measures to build a carbon peak, carbon neutral “1 + N” policy system. However, achieving the goal of “emission peaking and carbon neutrality” is a profound economic and social systemic change that is currently constrained by technology, complexity, and frontiers. In addition, China has a vast territory, and each province has a resource endowment and production factor endowment. There are regional heterogeneities in industrial structures and low-carbon economic development. Therefore, exploring the impact and path mechanism of industrial structure upgrades on the carbon emission intensity of various provinces and cities in China is of great significance for scientifically formulating carbon emission reduction policies.
In the early stage of economic development, traditional industrial structures led to the rapid growth of carbon emissions, and this extensive growth model no longer matches the goal of low-carbon development at this stage [
2]. With the continuous development of research relating to industrial structures and carbon emissions in the 21st century, scholars believe that upgrading industrial structures provides scientific guidance for industrial upgrade and transformation, which is an effective way to reduce carbon emissions [
3]. Adjustment and change are of great significance for formulating carbon emission reduction policies. The relationship between industrial structures and carbon emission has been regarded as an important research subject by international organizations and academic circles.
Compared with the existing research, the possible marginal contributions of this paper are as follows: (1) Use the panel quantile regression model instead of the mean regression to make up for the lack of accuracy of the mean regression estimation and the fact that it can only examine the influence of covariates near the mean on the dependent variable and to investigate the heterogeneity of the impact of the industrial structure of each province on carbon emissions under different carbon emission levels. (2) Use the mediation effect model to empirically analyze the mediation transmission path of the impact of industrial structure upgrading on carbon emissions through energy structure optimization. (3) According to the research conclusions, propose a practical path to upgrade the industrial structure to promote the optimization of the energy structure and reduce carbon emissions and provide a new perspective and valuable reference for the scientific formulation of carbon emission reduction policies.
The rest of this paper is organized as follows:
Section 2 is a literature review and research hypothesis statement and theoretically analyzes the mechanism of an industrial structure affecting carbon emissions through the energy structure. Model construction, variable selection, and data are discussed in
Section 3.
Section 4 lists a panel-based analysis of the practical results of quantile regression and the mediation effect model.
Section 5 summarizes the paper, provides conclusions, proposes theoretical implications and relevant policy suggestions, and makes a recommendation for future research in view of limitations.
5. Discussion
This paper takes the panel data of 30 provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities directly under the central government in China from 1997 to 2019 as the research sample. It uses the panel quantile regression model to study the regional differences in the impact of industrial structure on carbon emissions in the 30 provinces and analyze the dynamic change process under different quantiles. Furthermore, the mediation effect model was used to investigate the relationships and transmission mechanisms between upgrading industrial structures, energy structure optimization, and carbon emission reduction. The main conclusions are as follows: (1) Overall, both regional industrial structure upgrades and energy structure optimization have significant inhibitory effects on carbon emissions. (2) As the quantile increases, the regression coefficient of the impact of industrial structures on carbon emissions generally presents a “U-shaped” trend. After taking the absolute value of the coefficient, the regression coefficients first take on a downward and then upward and finally downward trend with the changing quantile. (3) The elastic coefficients of the seven influencing factors, including industrial structure, were significantly different in different quantiles. That is, the impact on the carbon emission intensity of different provinces was significantly different in magnitude and direction. The main factors that inhibit carbon emissions are industrial structure and technological progress. On the contrary, the factors that promote the growth of carbon emission intensity are the energy structure, import and export trade, population size, and urbanization level. (4) Upgrading industrial structures plays a significant role in promoting the optimization of energy structures. (5) Upgrading industrial structures can not only directly restrain carbon emissions but also indirectly have a significant inhibitory effect on carbon emissions by promoting the optimization of energy structures.
According to the findings above, the theoretical implications can be given as follows: (1) When comparing our results to those of older studies, it must be pointed out that we focused on the differences in the effects of factors, such as the industrial structure, between provinces and different carbon emission intensities on carbon emission reduction, which may enrich research results regarding the application of the quantile model in the field of carbon emission reduction. (2) Based on the mediation effect, previous studies believed that industrial structures would have an impact on carbon emissions, but there has been little empirical research on the impact path of “Industrial Structure Upgrading—Energy Structure Optimization—Carbon Emission Reduction”. This study uses the mediation effect model to verify this and supplements the research literature on the mechanisms of industrial structures in relation to carbon emissions.
Based on the above conclusions, this paper proposes the following suggestions: (1) Adhere to the principle of the scientific layout of industrial structures and implement differentiated industrial development strategies. In provinces where the industrial structure has a strong inhibitory effect on carbon emissions, it is necessary to continue to deepen industrial reform, take advantage of knowledge-intensive and technological innovation, vigorously promote the development of high-tech industries, and promote the further convergence of carbon emissions. In provinces where the industrial structure has a relatively weak inhibitory effect on carbon emissions, the adjustment of the industrial structure and the transformation of the regional economy will require a long period of transition and a change in driving force. During this period, it is necessary to seize development opportunities and change the weak state. Actively encourage the development of strategic emerging industries and service industries and continuously reduce the proportion of high-energy-consuming industries in the regional economy. When necessary, a plan to eliminate backward production capacity can be implemented, a mechanism for exiting backward production capacity can be established and improved, and the internal structure of the primary, secondary, and tertiary industries can be continuously optimized in order to effectively and accurately empower carbon emission reductions. (2) Reasonably divide regions, identify key provinces, and adopt targeted energy policies. For provinces whose energy structure has a strong inhibitory effect on carbon emissions, the energy policy should continue to adjust the energy structure as the primary task: promote the development of energy diversification, reduce the proportion of fossil energy in the energy structure, and accelerate the development and utilization of new energy. Develop renewable energy sources, such as wind energy, solar energy, biomass energy, and geothermal energy, according to the local conditions, increase the replacement ratio of renewable energy and new energy, and build a safer, more efficient, cleaner, low-carbon, and green energy supply and consumption system. For provinces whose energy structure is relatively weak in inhibiting carbon emissions, policy directions should be adjusted to improve energy efficiency, as follows: increase the introduction, digestion and absorption, and innovation of high-tech and advanced applicable technologies, graft and transform traditional industries, and accelerate the technological upgrade of traditional industries. Promote reforming the system and mechanisms, strengthen the management of the energy industry and energy strategies, plans, policies, measures, supervision, and services. (3) Adhere to the principle of combining industrial structure adjustment and energy structure optimization. While actively adjusting the industrial structure, vigorously promote improving the internal energy efficiency of enterprises, develop and promote the utilization of renewable clean energy, and optimize the energy structure; promote the transformation and upgrade of traditional industries and encourage existing high energy-consuming enterprises to accelerate the transformation to low-consumption. Improve energy development strategies, planning, and industrial policies and develop low-carbon transportation and green buildings, etc.; build a public research and development platform for industrial technology and energy technology and promote collaborative innovation. (4) The adjustment of industrial structure has its own evolution law, and there are also interrelationships between industries. Therefore, while reducing carbon emissions, it is necessary to maintain stable and rapid economic growth, ensure the level of urbanization and other strategic goals, and coordinate planning from a global perspective. R&D expenditure and personnel investment in emission reduction technology should be further expanded to encourage technological progress; incentive and restrictive policies should be formulated to slow down population growth and housing demand and avoid irreversible environmental damage in some provinces; scientifically plan urban construction and promote the construction of new infrastructure; promote import and export trade to green trade; coastal provinces should give full play to their port advantages, establish a trade system compatible with the low-carbon economy, and improve the corresponding import and export trade mechanisms; inland provinces should adhere to technological innovation. On the basis of innovation and management innovation, actively play the positive effect of import and export trade and promote the expansion of the national carbon emission trading market, accelerate the inclusion of major energy-intensive industries, balance the relationship between carbon emission reduction and economic growth, and realize the goal of “double carbon” with the smallest investment.
Limitations and future research directions include the following: (1) In the quantile regression analysis, it was found that there were insignificant points in the carbon trading mechanism. One possible reason is that the subject and duration of policy implementation are insufficient, and it is difficult to find regularity. At present, the geographical and industry scope of carbon market transactions is being promoted, and it is believed that more sufficient data will be included in future research. (2) The impact of the industrial structure on carbon emissions may have other impact mechanisms. In the future, research will continue to focus on other impact paths to build a more efficient carbon reduction mechanism by optimizing the industrial structure. (3) This paper uses the industrial structure as one of the key variables, but our data mainly divide the industries of each province into primary, secondary, and tertiary industries and does not conduct a more detailed study on the carbon emission impact mechanism under each industry. The following research can shift the research perspective from industry to industry by conducting research on the factors affecting carbon emissions in key industries with relatively unreasonable energy consumption structures and heavy carbon usage and comparing various industries to test this research again.