The Relationship between Environmental Regulation, Industrial Transformation Change and Urban Low-Carbon Development: Evidence from 282 Cities in China

Environmental regulation (ER) plays an important role in urban low-carbon development (ULCD). First of all, we evaluate the ULCD level of 282 cities in China from 2005 to 2020 by constructing an index group and entropy method. Two panel models are then used to test the spillover effects and threshold effects of ER and industrial structure on ULCD. The results show that the ULCD level of most cities is still in grade III (0.27–0.38) or IV (0.38–0.49), and the level of central-western cities is generally lower than that of eastern cities. Furthermore, the spillover effect of ER and industrial structure upgrading (UIS) on ULCD is positive in eastern cities (0.038) but opposite in central or western cities (−0.024). Further results show that the positive effects of optimization of industrial structure (OIS) and UIS are gradually increasing with the improvement of ER. However, the positive effects are more beneficial to the eastern cities. Therefore, the conclusions of this study can provide a decision-making reference for local government to comprehensively formulate environmental and industrial policies to enhance the low-carbon development of cities.