Does tourism industry agglomeration improve China's energy and carbon emissions performance?

The tourism industry is seen as having great potential, but tourism development and tourism activities may increase energy consumption and environmental pressure. Based on the provincial panel data of China from 2000 to 2017, we calculate the energy and carbon emission performance by using the non-radial distance function (NDDF) and further investigate the impact of tourism industry agglomeration on energy and carbon emission efficiency by combining the panel fixed effect model, mediation effect model and quantile regression. Our research results show that there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between tourism industry agglomeration and energy and carbon emission efficiency, and tourism industry agglomeration can improve energy and carbon emission efficiency at present. At the same time, the impact of tourism industry agglomeration on energy and carbon emission efficiency has regional heterogeneity. The industrial structure upgrading plays an important role in the process of tourism industry agglomeration. In addition, with the improvement of energy and carbon emission performance, the impact of tourism industry agglomeration is also different. These findings suggest that policymakers should promote tourism industry agglomeration to realize energy conservation and emission reduction. The Chinese government should focus on the tourism resources and advantages of different regions and formulate differentiated regional policies to improve ecological performance.