The Impact Of Green Credit On Energy Intensity

Over the past 40 years since the reform and opening up,China’s energy consumption has also been rising,and energy intensity has remained high.How to reduce energy intensity has become the focus of improving environmental pollution.The proposal and development of green credit policies have played an important role in energy conservation and emission reduction and energy intensity reduction for enterprises and regions by adopting differentiated credit policies for environmental protection industries and high energy consuming industries and guiding the flow of funds to environmental protection industry departments.However,the implementation of the green credit policy will also increase the operating costs of high energy consuming industries,forcing them to evade environmental regulations through industrial transfer,making the industrial layout of the transfer out area develop towards energy conservation and environmental protection,while the industrial transfer in area is forced to undertake high energy consuming industries,thus affecting the energy intensity of the two places.In addition,under the Chinese model of political centralization and economic decentralization,local governments will make trade-offs between environment and economic growth in areas with different marketization levels,local protection levels and economic development pressures,resulting in unbalanced development of regional green credit,which will lead to different degrees of industrial transfer in different regions,affecting the role of green credit policies in reducing energy intensity.Therefore,the study of how green credit affects regional energy intensity through industrial transfer and the analysis of regional heterogeneity have important practical significance for strengthening the implementation effect of green credit policies at the national level,guiding enterprises to strengthen energy conservation and emission reduction,and achieving green transformation.This paper combs the literature research status of the relationship between green credit,industrial transfer and energy intensity,and puts forward the research hypothesis of this paper on the basis of externality theory,pollution paradise hypothesis and industrial location theory.On this basis,this paper takes the national provincial level panel data from 2007 to 2020 as a sample for empirical analysis,uses the dynamic system GMM method to study the overall impact of green credit on energy intensity,and the intermediary role of green credit on energy intensity through industrial transfer,and carries out a series of heterogeneity analysis.The main conclusions of this paper are as follows:(1)On the whole,the improvement of green credit development level can reduce energy intensity.(2)The green credit in the industrial transfer area has no significant impact on the local energy intensity,but the industrial transfer will lead to an increase in energy intensity;In the region of industry transfer out,green credit reduces the local energy intensity through industry transfer out.(3)Green credit cannot play an effective role in areas with low marketization level,while in areas with high marketization level,green credit develops well,which leads to the industrial transfer out and the decline of energy intensity.(4)For regions with low degree of local protection in high energy consuming industries,the development of green credit will effectively promote the industrial transfer out,which will reduce the local energy intensity,while green credit will have a reverse effect in regions with high level of local protection.(5)In regions with low pressure on economic development,green credit will reduce energy intensity through industrial transfer,while in regions with high pressure on economic development,green credit cannot play a role.The innovation of this paper is reflected in taking industrial transfer as a way of green credit affecting regional energy intensity,and exploring the impact of industrial transfer on regional energy intensity caused by the differences in the implementation of green credit policies among regions through heterogeneity test.In addition,the industrial transfer indicators used in this article can better characterize the direction and scale of industrial transfer.In conclusion,this paper verifies the impact of green credit on energy intensity and the role of green credit in energy intensity through the intermediary role of industrial transfer.The conclusion of this article can provide the following policy insights in terms of green credit policies,industrial development policies,and energy policy improvement:firstly,in terms of green credit policies,investment in green credit should be increased,while strengthening supervision of green credit to ensure that green credit can truly play its due role and guide the direction of industrial transfer.Secondly,in terms of industrial development policies,relevant policies should be formulated to guide the technology spillover effect of high energy consumption in the process of industrial transfer,so as to transform high energy consumption industries into green industries and improve the environmental protection and energy conservation level of the entire industry.Finally,in terms of energy policy,we should strengthen the research and development of energy technology,improve energy utilization efficiency,and encourage the use of more clean energy to reduce energy intensity.