Abstract
The traditional heavy industry creates not only economic value for societies and countries but also serious ecological and cultural damage. This type of industry is not easy to transform and upgrade because of its large-scale and complex characteristics, and its traditional management mode is being challenged. This study focused on the relation between China’s current ecotechnology and ecological innovation goals. This was investigated to research a new technology and goal management method, which would promote the transformation and upgradation of traditional heavy industry. We investigated 11 shipbuilding companies with strong comprehensive capacity in China’s shipbuilding bases, analyzed the viewpoints of 331 senior managers and designers with more than a decade of shipbuilding experience, and referred to the industry technical standards and literature to define types of shipbuilding ecotechnology and ecological innovation goals. Structural equation modeling was conducted to analyze the relation between them. The simulation results demonstrated that four types of ecotechnology (i.e., energy technology, shipbuilding technology, digital technology, and strategic management) represent the key factors affecting the shipbuilding ecological innovation goals. This study is of theoretical significance for traditional heavy industry, and its outcomes encourage the achievement of ecological innovation goals through the application of ecotechnology.
Highlights
A review of the historical development of heavy industry suggests that the maintenance of a certain number of heavy industry systems is the “threshold condition” for countries to achieve long-term economic growth; this can support the economic evolution of less-developed countries [1,2,3]
The types of technologies used in the traditional heavy industry are considerably complex; in this case, it is not easy to identify the categories of ecotechnology
Based on the expert opinion of China’s shipbuilding heavy industry and empirical analysis, we identified the elements of two variables, the internal relation between single variables, and the relation between the two variables; we defined the internal influence law of the two variables and externalized them and verified the hypothesis of this study
Summary
A review of the historical development of heavy industry suggests that the maintenance of a certain number of heavy industry systems is the “threshold condition” for countries to achieve long-term economic growth; this can support the economic evolution of less-developed countries [1,2,3]. The types of technologies used in the traditional heavy industry are considerably complex; in this case, it is not easy to identify the categories of ecotechnology This increases the difficulty for companies to achieve the ecological innovation goal. Based on the expert opinion of China’s shipbuilding heavy industry and empirical analysis, we identified the elements of two variables (i.e., ecotechnology and target), the internal relation between single variables, and the relation between the two variables; we defined the internal influence law of the two variables and externalized them and verified the hypothesis of this study This process was expected to provide a decision-making basis for the ecological innovation of the traditional heavy industry. They provide new ideas for the ecological transformation and upgradation of the traditional heavy industry
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
