How do the National Eco-Industrial Demonstration Parks affect urban total factor energy efficiency? Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment

Abstract

This study utilizes a non-radial Dynamic Slacks-Based Measure (DSBM) model to dynamically assess the total factor energy efficiency (TFEE) in each city using panel data from 265 prefecture-level cities in China from 2000 to 2018. We use the policy of building National Eco-Industrial Demonstration Parks (NEDPs) as a quasi-natural experiment and use the staggered difference-in-differences (DID) model to determine the policy's net impact on the urban TFEE. We find that the construction of NEDPs has greatly improved the urban TFEE, and the development of urban green finance has a positive regulatory effect on this impact. According to a heterogeneity analysis, the construction of NEDPs is more favourable to improving the TFEE of cities with local environmental regulations, and a high degree of openness. Further inspection of the mechanism test demonstrates that the economic agglomeration effect, the structural upgrading effect, and the innovation network effect are the transmission channels of NEDPs to facilitate the TEFF. In addition, the extended analyses show that the positive impact of NEDPs on promoting the TFEE stays robust under the consideration of heterogeneous treatment effect.