As a comprehensive environmental regulation, the low-carbon city pilot policy (LCCP) may have an impact on haze pollution. The evaluation of the effectiveness of LCCP on haze pollution is greatly significant for air pollution prevention and control. Taking LCCP as the starting point, in this study we constructed DID, PSM-DID, and intermediary effect models to empirically test the impact and mechanism of LCCP on haze pollution, based on the panel data of 271 cities in China from 2005 to 2018. The findings show that (1) LCCP has significantly reduced the urban haze pollution, and the average annual concentration of PM2.5 in pilot cities decreased by 14.29%. (2) LCCP can inhibit haze pollution by promoting technological innovation, upgrading the industrial structure, and reducing energy consumption. Among these impacts, the effect of technological innovation is the strongest, followed by industrial structure, and energy consumption. (3) LCCP has significantly curbed the haze pollution of non-resource dependent cities, Eastern cities, and large cities, but exerted little impact on resource-dependent cities, Central and Western regions, and small and medium-sized cities. (4) LCCP has a spatial spillover effect. It can inhibit the haze pollution of adjacent cities through demonstration and warning effects. This study enriches the relevant research on LCCP and provides empirical support and policy enlightenment for pollution reduction.

With the promotion of carbon-peak and carbon-neutral strategies and the increase in green awareness, green development is gradually gaining attention, and the green supply chain management (GSCM) derived from traditional supply chain management is gradually becoming a path to promote green development. At the same time, enterprise, as an important source of pollution, how to consider social responsibility, such as environmental protection, in the process of ensuring efficiency improvement has become an important issue. To study the impact of green supply chain management on enterprise value and its path of action, this paper examines the impact of green supply chain management on enterprise value, explores the moderating effect of the risk-taking level, and further analyzes the dual moderating effect played by technological innovation capability and supply chain concentration. Based on the micro data of 131 Chinese listed enterprises from 2014 to 2021, a panel-regression model is used to illustrate how green supply chain management affects enterprise value, and the results show that: 1) green supply chain management can promote enterprise value; 2) the level of risk-taking strengthens the promoting effect of green supply chain management on enterprise value enhancement; and 3) the technological innovation capability negatively regulates the moderating effect of risk-taking, while the supply chain concentration positively regulates the moderating effect of risk-taking. The research results of this paper enrich the path of the effect of implementing of green supply chain management on enterprise value enhancement, i.e., the process of green supply chain management to enhance enterprise value is regulated by the level of enterprise risk-taking, while technological innovation capability and supply chain concentration will also regulate the level of enterprise risk-taking and thus promote enterprise value enhancement. This research not only extends the research perspective and enriches the existing research, but also provides a theoretical basis for enterprises to implement green supply chain management to promote value enhancement and improve the level of green supply chain management implementation and the green development of enterprises.

China has promised to meet the “carbon peaking and carbon neutrality” goals. Exploring the relationship between innovative industrial agglomeration and environmental pollution plays an important role in the realization of these goals and sustainable development. Based on the panel data of 277 prefecture-level cities in China from 2007 to 2019, this paper uses the multi-period difference-in-difference (DID) model to examine the impact and mechanism of the innovative industrial agglomeration pilot (IIAP) policy on the environment. Furthermore, we explore the spatial effect of the IIAP using spatial DID. The findings show that, firstly, the IIAP policy significantly contributes to environmentally-friendly development in terms of enhancing carbon emission efficiency (CEE) and reducing environmental pollution index (EPI). Secondly, the IIAP policy promotes environmentally-friendly development mainly by improving the technological innovation level. Additionally, the heterogeneity analysis shows that the environmentally-friendly effect of the IIAP policy is primarily in the eastern region, large cities, and non-resource-based cities. Finally, there is a significant spatial effect of the IIAP policy on environmentally-friendly development, mainly reflected in the weak siphon effect between treatment group cities and neighboring regions. We suggest that the government should continue to maintain the steady growth of the IIAP cities and improve the energy utilization efficiency through a policy of green technology innovation. The government should also optimize the spatial layout of the pilot cities and make full use of the energy advantages of each region to better promote environmentally-friendly development.

With the frequent occurrence of various emergencies, the stable operation of enterprises has been seriously affected, and the research of resilience has received more and more attention in various fields. Enterprise resilience (En_RES) is not only related to corporate survival but is also the key to determining whether a company can realize long-term development. To explore the impact of En_RES on enterprise sustainable development (En_SD), this paper conducts an empirical test using panel regression models based on the data of A-share listed companies in China from 2004 to 2022. It is found that En_RES has a significant positive contribution to En_SD, which is more obvious when the degree of environmental uncertainty is lower, the degree of information sharing is higher, and the degree of business complexity is higher. The mechanism test analysis finds that En_RES can further contribute to En_SD by reducing the bankruptcy risk, improving credit availability, and optimizing resource allocation efficiency. This paper innovatively analyzes and verifies the impact of En_RES on En_SD and its functioning mechanism from the perspective of microenterprises, which not only enrich the theoretical relationship between En_RES and En_SD but also provide important references for enterprises to pay attention to and develop resilience in practice, which can help enterprises better cope with challenges, grasp opportunities, and make contributions to the sustainable development of enterprises.

Climate risks drive dynamic adjustments to global climate policies, creating significant climate policy uncertainty (CPU). This uncertainty profoundly affects enterprises’ survival and sustainable development. A key question emerges: how do enterprises’ perception of CPU influence their resilience? To answer this, this study adopts a capability perspective and empirically examines the impact of climate policy uncertainty perception (CPUP) on enterprise resilience (RESI) and the underlying mechanism. Using panel data on Chinese A-share listed companies on the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges from 2009 to 2023, the study defines CPUP as the interaction between a news-based provincial CPU index and the frequency of climate risk words in annual report texts, and measures RESI with the entropy weight method across four dimensions (business volatility, long-term growth, short-term performance, and enterprise survival). Panel regression with fixed effects indicates that CPUP significantly enhances RESI. A one-standard-deviation increase in CPUP raises RESI by approximately 0.0019 index units, equivalent to about 2.2% of the standard deviation of RESI. This effect is more pronounced for enterprises in the eastern and central regions and in high-carbon industries. Mechanism tests confirm that CPUP boosts RESI by optimizing management capabilities and strengthening development capabilities, revealing a capability-driven path between CPUP and RESI. This study enriches the theoretical understanding of CPU’s economic consequences and RESI antecedents from a capability perspective. It also provides empirical references for enterprises to build resilience amid policy fluctuations and for policymakers to formulate regionally differentiated climate policies.