Green effects of research and development on industrial waste reduction during the production phase: Evidence from China and policy implications

Maintaining public health requires a clean environment; however, some industrial wastes can damage the water, atmosphere, and living environment seriously. To promote green development, policy makers in China have developed and implemented strict environmental regulations to limit the pollutant emissions and improve the environmental quality. Industrial producers implement research and development (R&D) activities to gain more profits in competitive markets. A comprehensive understanding of the green effects of R&D on different industrial wastes could provide important policy recommendations, especially regarding the coordination of innovative and green developments. In this study, the author empirically analyzed the influence of R&D input, including the intramural expenditure on R&D and full-time equivalent of R&D personnel, on industrial wastes, including the discharge of chemical oxygen demand (COD) and ammonia nitrogen, emission of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and particulate matter, and generation of common industrial solid and hazardous wastes, based on the data from Chinese industrial sectors for 2016–2020. The main findings of empirical analyses were robust and indicated that R&D activities significantly reduced the emissions of all three industrial waste gases and decreased the discharge of COD; however, in the case of China, the partial effects on the discharge of ammonia nitrogen and the industrial solid wastes were not statistically significant. The green effects of R&D on different industrial wastes may vary and generally depend on environmental regulations, with various limitations. The most viable policy recommendations indicate that by expanding and initiating the green effect of R&D on different industrial wastes, innovative and green developments are more likely to be achieved in a coordinated manner. Additionally, this can also support special R&D activities, with the added benefit of actively developing cleaner technology to treat pollutant emissions. Development, while maintaining a clean environment to ensure public health, could be more sustainable if innovative activities reduce the production of industrial wastes. This study analyzes the green effects of R&D on industrial waste and can serve as a viable framework for future studies on sustainable development.