ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Can Clean Energy Consumption Promote
the Decoupling Between Economic Growth
and Environmental Pollution? – Spatial Empirical
Analysis Based on China
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1
Business College, Guilin University of Technology, Guilin 532100, China
2
College of Public Administration, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China
Submission date: 2020-10-06
Final revision date: 2020-12-16
Acceptance date: 2020-12-20
Online publication date: 2021-05-12
Publication date: 2021-07-07
Corresponding author
Yifan Wang
College of Public Administration, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China
Pol. J. Environ. Stud. 2021;30(4):3787-3802
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ABSTRACT
High hopes are placed on the production and use of clean energy during the decoupling between
economic growth and environmental pollution. This article uses the decoupling model to study
the temporal and spatial coupling characteristics of economic growth and environmental pollution
in different regions of China. On this basis, a spatial measurement model is used to quantitatively
evaluate the effects of clean energy consumption on the decoupling of economic growth and
environmental pollution. The results show that during the study period, the areas where economic
growth and environmental pollution generally showed strong decoupling gradually increased, and
the areas showing coupling gradually decreased. Moreover, the decoupling state has obvious spatial
heterogeneity and spatial aggregation characteristics. Clean energy consumption can significantly
promote the decoupling of economic growth and environmental pollution. In addition, the analysis
of direct effects shows that clean energy consumption has a significant negative effect on the decoupling
of regional economic growth from SO2 emissions and DS (dust and smoke) emissions. But the indirect
effect and total effect are not obvious. It further proves that clean energy consumption has no significant
effect on promoting the decoupling of surrounding areas and all areas except the local area.