智慧城市建设与城市碳排放：基于数字技术赋能路径的检验

智慧城市作为数字时代技术赋能型城市发展的新模式、新趋势，对我国实现低碳转型具有关键性作用。基于2006—2019年我国223个城市面板数据，实证研究智慧城市建设对城市碳排放的影响效应。研究发现：①智慧城市建设显著降低了城市碳排放，在引入PSM-DID、空间DID等模型进行稳健性检验后该结论依然成立；②智慧城市通过数字技术创新的直接路径和“数字技术创新→产业结构升级”的间接路径影响城市碳排放；③在人力资本、资金、物质越集聚的城市，数字技术赋能路径对城市碳减排的正向调节作用越显著。上述研究对我国实现碳达峰碳中和、城市实现数字赋能与低碳引领的双轮驱动发展具有重要现实意义。

Smart City Construction and Urban Carbon Emissions:The Test Based on Digital Technology Empowerment Path

In the era of industrialization, the development of urbanization will undoubtedly lead to a continuous increase in carbon emissions, which can also be directly observed from the growth and evolution of historical data on carbon emissions in industrialized countries. But it is worth asking whether this law still applies to the relationship between urbanization and carbon emissions in the era of digital economy? The innovation and breakthrough of the current digital technology have provided different paths and connotations to the development of urbanization. Among them, the smart city is a typical model of urban development in the digital age. Will smart city construction under the empowerment or blessing of digital technology have different effects on carbon emissions in Chinese cities? In which way does this effect work? What are the heterogeneous impacts caused by the different development endowments or characteristics of smart cities?#br#Given the characteristics and facts of smart city pilots enabling cities to reduce carbon emissions in the context of China, this paper uses urban panel data from 2006 to 2019, and comprehensively adopts a multi-phase DID model from the perspective of digital technology innovation to empirically examine the internal mechanisms and causal effects of smart city pilots affecting urban carbon emissions. It is found that firstly smart city pilots can effectively promote carbon emission reduction in Chinese cities, and strongly support the carbon neutralization and carbon peaking action. The PSM-DID model and spatial DID model overcome sample selection bias and spatial effects. After re-estimating the impact, the conclusion is still robust. Secondly smart city pilots mainly use the direct path of digital technology innovation and the indirect path of “digital technology innovation→industrial structure upgrade” to promote cities to achieve carbon emission reduction. Digital technology innovation and industrial structure upgrade can form a chain of cause and effect to jointly help smart cities achieve carbon neutral carbon peak action. Thirdly heterogeneity analysis shows that the more fully supported by human, capital and information infrastructure, the stronger the effect of promoting urban carbon emission reduction, the main reason is the agglomeration of human capital, financial capital, financial capital and physical capital. It has a significant positive adjustment function for the digital technology innovation of the city.#br#Therefore it is essential to further strengthen the research and development and application of digital technology in the field of carbon emission reduction, give full play to the key role of big data, cloud computing and Internet of Things and other cutting-edge technologies in carbon emission source locking, data analysis, etc., and use digital technology to link the supply and consumption ends of industrial sectors, so that it might be possible to design the zero-carbon power system, low-carbon/zero-carbon terminal energy consumption system and negative emission technology of smart city and realize the refined, online and intelligent management of urban carbon emission. It is also necessary to exert the potential enabling role of advanced industrial structure in urban carbon emission reduction. It is not only significant to speed up the upgrading and transition of the industrial structure to a modern industrial structure dominated by the tertiary industry, but also to promote low-carbon and green development within the industry, and gradually use clean energy to replace fossil energy in traditional industries. Accordingly it is imperative to adopt a variety of public policy measures such as human capital improvement, fiscal and technological expenditure expansion,etc. to support smart cities to enhance digital technology innovation endowments and capabilities, promote the leap-forward development of "new digital infrastructure", digital economy and innovative infrastructure, strengthen the fundamental research on digital technology and focus on common technologies, further shorten the research and development cycle and improve the efficiency of research and development. Lastly it is suggested to expand smart city pilots. On the basis of the first three batches of smart city pilots, sum up experience, gradually cover all cities in my country with smart city construction, improve the intelligence level of construction, management and services of various cities, and make overall planning for the development of Chinese cities.#br#