Does sustainable digital economy have implications for climate change? Novel evidence in the context of sustainable energy technologies

Abstract

China has developed a wide variety of solutions to enhance environmental quality to address the challenges posed by climate change. In recent years, China has shifted more of its attention toward the digital economy to overhaul the structure of its economy. The digital economy is becoming increasingly essential, and its role in achieving sustainability is becoming gradually linked. The aims of sustainable development and the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions are being worked on using digital technologies. In the context of China, this research paper investigates the impact of digital economy on China's climate change from 1996 to 2017. The study comprehensively analyzes the carbon footprint of China's digital technologies, including data centers, e-commerce, and mobile devices. It identifies the key drivers of carbon emissions in China's digital economy and proposes practical strategies to reduce them. Using quantile regressions approach, this study finds that digital economy has a greater impact on CO2 emissions in provinces that already emit a relatively high amount of carbon and is diminished in provinces that already emit a relatively low amount of carbon. However, digital economy does not have any bearing on CO2 emissions for the first three quantiles (Q0.25, Q0.50 and Q0.75). This suggests that the effect of digital economy on CO2 emissions is only seen over the longer term. Therefore, it is important to build the digital structure in such a way as to optimize the structure of energy consumption. This can be accomplished by optimizing the structure. This allows for the possibility of the digital economy eventually achieving reduced levels of CO2 emissions.