Evaluating the Impact of Smart City Policy on Carbon Emission Efficiency

Abstract

Smart city policy (SCP) is crucial to addressing climate change and achieving sustainable urban development with low carbon emissions. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the mechanisms through which smart city policies have an impact on carbon emission efficiency (CEE). In terms of research methodology, we construct a quasi-natural experiment on smart city policies in China and use the time-varying DID approach to study this issue. The DEA method was used to measure the CEE. For the data sample, panel data from 281 cities in China between 2007 and 2020 was used in this study. The findings are as follows: ① SCP has a significant impact on CEE. This conclusion remains valid after introducing parallel trend tests, placebo tests, and other robustness tests. ② The mechanism test result reveals that SCP has a positive impact on urban CEE through three main channels: promoting industrial upgrading, increasing public environmental attention, and enhancing marketization. ③ The analysis of heterogeneity reveals that the impact of SCP on CEE is noticeable in cities that belong to well-developed economic regions with a lower intensity of environmental regulations, higher levels of green finance, and fewer official changes. This research contributes to the existing literature on the environmental assessment of SCP and offers valuable policy insights for cities to tackle climate change and sustainable urban planning.