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The purpose of this research is to determine the impact of innovation, economic growth, financial development, trade, foreign direct investment (FDI), electricity consumption, and urbanization on the environmental degradations in Pakistan. This study has employed the dynamic autoregressive distributed lag model (ARDL), to investigate the actual change in the independent variables and its impact on the dependent variable through graphs. The findings demonstrate that energy consumption, GDP growth, urbanization, and trade negatively influence the carbon emissions in the short term. On the other hand, the findings indicate that in the long term, only GDP growth and trade had a significantly negative impact on emissions. Urbanization has a positive and considerable impact on the emissions of carbon dioxide in the long run. On the other hand, financial development and foreign direct investment (FDI) help reduce the environmental degradation in the short term and long term. Moreover, innovation positively affects the carbon emissions in both the long and short run. Policy recommendations are given based on the findings of this study., (© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

To cope with global climate change and energy security, the realization of the low-carbon energy transition has become an inevitable choice for international carbon emission reduction requirements and energy structure adjustment. Vigorously developing renewable energy has become an essential part of energy policies in many countries. Under the incentive and guidance of renewable energy industry policy, China's renewable energy has developed rapidly, and energy structure has been optimized. However, many problems have been exposed. Can China's renewable energy industry policy effectively support low-carbon energy transition? This paper uses the method of theoretical analysis, combining literature analysis and data analysis. Based on the analysis of renewable energy policies in countries with relatively mature energy transitions, it analyzes the status quo, implementation effect, and problems of renewable energy policy in China and proposes policy suggestions. According to the research, the existing problems are as follows: (1) diminishing marginal effect of policies, (2) policy adjustment is not timely and lacks details and operability, (3) coordination conflicts between the old and new policies, (4) unreasonable policy supply structure, and (5) the negative impact of subsidy policy is increasing. Therefore, this paper argues that China's renewable energy industry policy cannot effectively support the low-carbon energy transition., (© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Currently, China is facing severe pressure of environmental emission reduction. As a kind of clean energy, waste-to-energy technology has the advantages of renewability, low pollution, and stable supply. To establish an affordable, effective, and sustainable waste disposable method is critical for the low carbon society transition. Therefore, the innovation diffusion of waste incineration power technology is a problem worth studying. Based on this, in order to answer this question scientifically, this paper constructs a system dynamics model of innovative diffusion, and analyzes the internal mechanism of innovation diffusion. The results show that firstly, the government support policies have a positive influence on the innovation and diffusion of waste incineration power technology; secondly, compared with the R&D policy, feed-in tariffs policy is more efficient to expand the installed capacity of waste incineration power; At last, technological innovation caused by government support policies is the main driving force of waste incineration power industry investment cost reduction., (© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

China's foreign direct investment is an important driving force for economic growth, which also aggravates carbon emissions. Based on China's provincial panel data from 2003 to 2018, this paper uses the panel-fixed effect model and panel threshold model to explore the impacts of two-way foreign direct investment on carbon emissions and analyze the threshold effects of different environmental regulations. The empirical results show that inward foreign direct investment (IFDI) has a significant inhibitory effect on carbon emissions, while outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) leads to the aggravation of carbon emissions. Considering regional heterogeneity, environmental regulation in high-carbon areas mainly affects local OFDI, and environmental regulation in low-carbon areas mainly inhibits carbon emissions by affecting IFDI. In addition, high-carbon regions can achieve the inhibition of OFDI on carbon emissions by strengthening command-and-control regulation and reducing the promotion of OFDI on carbon emissions by strengthening market incentive regulation and voluntary regulation. Meanwhile, excessive command-and-control regulation and market incentive regulation in low-carbon areas bring unexpected regulatory effects, but the inhibitory effect of IFDI on carbon emissions can be increased by strengthening voluntary regulation., (© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

With the process of China's economic transformation and structural adjustment, the trend of thermal power industry transfer is more and more obvious. Under the background of industrial transfer, the research of the influence of environmental regulation on technological innovation has become a vital issue that needs to be discussed urgently for the current high-quality economic development. Based on the thermal power industry data in 30 provinces of China from 2008 to 2017, this paper constructs a mediating effect model to examine the relationship among environmental regulation, industrial transfer, and technological innovation. The results reveal that: (1) there is a U-shaped relationship between environmental regulation and technological innovation; (2) the increase of environmental regulation intensity promotes the thermal power industry to move to areas with loose environmental regulation; (3) industrial transfers play a mediating role in the process of environmental regulation influencing technological innovation. Therefore, the government should formulate scientifically effective environmental regulation policies so that the thermal power industry can realize orderly transfer and realize technological innovation., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Government incentive policies play an important role in the promotion of distributed photovoltaic power. However, which policy is more effective for the diffusion of distributed photovoltaic power? This is a question that needs to be answered. Based on this, we combined the two-factor learning curve and system dynamics model to study the dynamic diffusion process of China's distributed photovoltaic power (DSP). The results show that (1) the coefficients of learning by doing and learning by researching for DSP are 0.0435 and 0.2971 respectively. This indicates that technological innovation caused by R&D expenditures in the DSP is the driving force for cost reduction. (2) Both demand-pull and technology-push policies contribute to the diffusion of DSP; (3) the effect of FIT policy on the diffusion of distributed photovoltaic technology is more significant than that of R&D policy; and the reduction of production cost of photovoltaic power industry by R&D policy is more significant than FIT policy., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Developing countries are enthusiastically on the road to economic progress and economic openness, which is proved to be a silver bullet for them. However, it has put their environmental quality at stake. This study examines whether economic openness and electricity consumption matter for environmental deterioration by controlling for the influence of economic progress. For this, we have used time series frequency data of Pakistan from 1971 to 2016 and employed the state-of-the-art dynamic autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) simulation model. The model has the advantage over traditional ARDL in determining the positive and negative environmental deterioration variations induced by economic openness, electricity consumption, and economic progress. The main findings are as follows: Firstly, electricity consumption in both long and short run positively and significantly influenced CO 2 emissions, while long-run influence exceeded that of short run. Secondly, economic progress validated an environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis and thus limited the environmental degradation. Thirdly, economic openness showed an insignificant influence on CO 2 emissions both in the long and short run. Based on research findings, it is suggested that economic progress and economic openness are not the direct culprits to deteriorate a developing country's environmental condition like Pakistan; rather, electricity consumption remained the key role player. Therefore, the transition from fossil-based electricity consumption to renewable energy consumption would provide a sustainable pathway towards achieving sustainable economic openness in the future., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

Among the regulatory policies, feed-in tariffs (FIT) and renewable portfolio standards (RPS) are the most popular to promote the development of renewable energy power industry. They can significantly contribute to the expansion of domestic industrial activities in terms of sustainable energy. This paper uses system dynamics (SD) to establish models of long-term development of China's waste incineration power industry under FIT and RPS schemes, and provides a case study by using scenario analysis method. The model, on the one hand, not only clearly shows the complex logical relationship between the factors but also assesses policy effects of the two policy tools in the development of the industry. On the other hand, it provides a reference for scholars to study similar problems in different countries, thereby facilitating an understanding of waste incineration power's long-term sustainable development pattern under FIT and RPS schemes, and helping to provide references for policy-making institutions. The results show that in the perfect competitive market, the implementation of RPS can promote long-term and rapid development of China's waste incineration power industry given the constraints and actions of the mechanisms of RPS quota proportion, the TGC valid period, and fines, compared with FIT. At the end of the paper, policy implications are offered as references for the government., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)