Influence of research and development, environmental regulation, and consumption of energy on CO2 emissions in China—novel spatial Durbin model perspective

Global warming continues to be an intimidating factor for environmental protection, and reducing carbon emissions is an effective way to deal with the phenomenon. However, the energy sector is a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. Therefore, investment in environmental regulations and research and development (R&D), is critical for fostering a low-carbon growth model. This study focuses on 30 provinces in China from 2004 to 2019. We used the spatial Durbin model to investigate how the spatial spillover effect of R&D and environmental regulation impacts carbon emissions. In addition, we applied the dynamic threshold panel model to mitigate potential problems of endogeneity. The results reveal that carbon emissions have a considerable spatial correlation in both temporal and spatial dimensions, exhibiting high and low-value accumulation characteristics. Furthermore, the combined effect of R&D intensity, environmental regulation, and energy consumption were found to contribute to the increase in carbon emissions across China’s provinces, and they also suggest different influencing mechanisms. The spillover effects of increased carbon emissions in neighboring regions also contribute to the increase in local carbon emissions. The study also found that R&D and stringent environmental regulations measures strongly moderate the link between energy consumption and carbon emissions. In promoting carbon reduction, by breaking the dynamic equilibrium in China, the provincial investment outflow on R&D intensity could be optimized, and the regional levels should focus more on tightening environmental regulatory measures and promoting the development of energy-conserving technologies.