Identifying the path and effectiveness of governance tools is the key to environmental NIMBY (not in my back yard) event governance. However, there are limited studies on the path between effective governance tools and environmental NIMBY events. Based on the theory of emotional catharsis, we establish an analytical framework for the evolution of the environmental NIMBY event and analyze the effectiveness of the current main governance tools. The results show that government solicitation of opinions (GSOs) governance tools are insignificant in the governance of resistance behavior. The effects of public demand communication (PDC) governance tools and compensation negotiation (CN)governance tools on resistance behaviors all show a significant negative correlation; negative emotions play an intermediary role in their governance tools. The overall performance is that the greater the compensation, the lower the willingness to engage in resistance behavior. The establishment of a reasonable compensation system can effectively reduce the public’s willingness to engage in resistance behavior. Through the evaluation of the effectiveness of governance tools in environmental NIMBY events, this study helps to improve governance tools and has important practical significance for solving the environmental NIMBY dilemma.

The urban carbon administration discussion is becoming dominant in the carbon emission reduction landscape. China, the world’s paramount carbon emitter, has instituted a series of policies geared towards carbon emissions reduction. The co-dependent nature of these policies becomes paramount in outlining accurate and comprehensive evaluation results. This research scrutinizes the effect of various policy mixtures on curbing urban carbon emissions, utilizing the Tapio decoupling elasticity coefficient and fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) techniques. The consistencies surpass the widely accepted theoretical threshold of 0.8, and each configuration can explain 14.3% to 19.8% of the sample. The findings reveal that industrial and energy policies drive the decoupling of urban carbon emissions in three of four configurations. Management-based policies merely play an auxiliary role, while social and economic policies have yet to exhibit significant implications. The outcomes of this research offer a framework for augmenting the carbon emission reduction policy system and fostering the advancement of carbon reduction initiatives.

The Chinese government has been working hard to improve environmental performance. However, considering that public feedback is not always complimentary, there is still room for improvement in its protection work. In China, environmental planning is the dominant direction of the government’s environmental governance. Therefore, an analysis of environmental planning could explain the policy incentives that lead to inconsistent performance and satisfaction, and could enable us to explore how to improve planning to more effectively achieve environmental governance goals. This study classified 37 Chinese cities into four types based on consistency in performance and satisfaction. Taking environmental planning policy as the research object, the planning work arrangements of different cities to improve environmental performance and public satisfaction were analyzed through hand-coding. Our study found that environmental planning in these cities puts more emphasis on basic and engineering arrangements that can effectively improve environmental performance, while work arrangements that involve improving public environmental satisfaction are relatively few. Moreover, (1) cities with high environmental performance and high public satisfaction have made relatively substantial arrangements in improving environmental performance and satisfaction during environmental planning; (2) cities with high environmental performance and low public satisfaction have a certain foundation for environmental governance, but tough governance or high public expectations weaken environmental satisfaction; (3) cities with low environmental performance and high public environmental satisfaction have low environmental performance values due to the huge energy consumption of resources or a lack of pollution disposal capacity; and (4) most of the cities with low environmental performance and low public environmental satisfaction share common geographical and historical environmental problems that make it challenging to considerably enhance public satisfaction and environmental performance in the short term. Based on the above findings, this paper believes that greater environmental governance can be achieved by promoting a change in environmental planning from the existing “elite” planning paradigm to a “participatory” planning model.

Renewable energy’s integral role in addressing the global climate crisis underscores the importance of crafting coordinated policies to bolster its growth. Shandong Province, as China’s largest carbon emitter, presents an intriguing case study. Leveraging policy text analysis and the coupling coordination model, this research investigates the interplay among the diverse policy instruments within Shandong Province’s renewable energy policies. The findings reveal a harmonious and varied array of policy instruments. Yet, notable disparities emerge when examining secondary policy instruments across different types of renewable energy. Consequently, this paper offers strategic recommendations to improve the coupling coordination and utilization of policy instruments across various types of renewable energy. The ultimate aim is to strengthen policy synergies, overhaul the energy structure, and make a meaningful contribution to global climate change mitigation efforts.

Under the requirements of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals, the value added of Chinese industrial enterprises may face pressure, especially for those with high carbon emissions, where the constraints are more apparent. It is urgent to explore a long-term development path for enterprises to achieve value addition while managing environmental responsibilities effectively. This study conducts an empirical analysis using the unbalanced panel data of 3137 Chinese A-share listed industrial enterprises from 2008 to 2023. It constructs a comprehensive index covering 7 dimensions and 22 indicators to evaluate corporate environmental management capabilities based on three aspects: government policy requirements, corporate management needs, and public social demands. In this study, a dynamic panel differential generalised moment estimation model (dif-GMM) is established to investigate the impact of environmental management capabilities on economic value added. By categorising industrial enterprises into heavily polluting industries and non-heavily polluting industries, the study further investigates the differences in impact. The results show a significant positive correlation between environmental management capabilities and the amount of economic value added, with a stronger correlation for enterprises in heavily polluting industries. The article provides suggestions from government, enterprises, and societal perspectives to promote a virtuous cycle of enhanced environmental management capabilities and value addition, jointly advancing carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals.