SPATIAL EFFECTS OF TECHNOLOGY INNOVATION ON ENERGY-RELATED CARBON EMISSIONS: A SPATIAL PANEL APPROACH

China has committed to reducing carbon emissions in the face of serious atmospheric pollution. Based on the spatial approach using panel data, this study examines the spatial pattern and spatial effects of technique innovation performance on energy-related carbon emissions from the perspective of both time and space. An exploratory spatial technique is employed for analysing the spatial pattern of China's provincial carbon emissions and technology innovation. Furthermore, based on a classic spatial panel lag model, a spatial panel error model and a spatial panel Durbin-IPAT model, this study provides a spatial analysis of the relation between technology innovation and carbon emissions, including direct effects, indirect effects and total effects. Exploratory spatial results show that there are spatial spillover and clustering effects of carbon emissions and technology progress. The spatial panel data model estimation results show that technology innovation factors have significant negative effects on carbon emissions in spatial fixed effects, time-period fixed effects and spatial time-period effects. The empirical results identify the inhibition effects of technology innovation on carbon emissions in provincial areas and further provide a new path to break regional disparity in the context of sustainable development and emission reduction.