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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Environ. Sci.
Sec. Environmental Policy and Governance
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fenvs.2025.1524824
This article is part of the Research Topic Advancing Carbon Reduction and Pollution Control Policies Management: Theoretical, Application, and Future Impacts View all 22 articles

Environmental Technology's Diminishing Marginal Returns: A Study of Green Patents and Emission Reductions in China

Provisionally accepted
Xiaoyu Yin Xiaoyu Yin 1Baofeng Xu Baofeng Xu 2Jia Li Jia Li 1*Jingyi Wu Jingyi Wu 1
  • 1 Shandong Normal University, Jinan, China
  • 2 Shandong Yingcai University, Jinan, Shandong, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Do environmental technologies always yield desirable returns? This paper attempts to answer this question from the perspective of a command-and-control environmental regulation. By constructing a socio-economic model that incorporates pollution discharge issues, this paper explores the mechanisms affecting the efficacy of technology in reducing emissions. It finds that under equilibrium conditions, the existing technological challenges render the marginal effects of emission reduction through technology to exhibit non-linear characteristics, leading to diminishing marginal returns on technological innovation. Drawing on green patent data from Chinese listed companies spanning 2005-2020 and pollution emissions data from various cities, this study empirically validates this conclusion using fixed effects models and generalized random forest models. It further analyzes patent categories and city characteristics to identify factors that can influence technological emission reduction, thereby proposing strategic recommendations.

    Keywords: Environmental technology, Green patents, treatment effects, Fixed effects model, generalized random forest

    Received: 08 Nov 2024; Accepted: 15 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Yin, Xu, Li and Wu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Jia Li, Shandong Normal University, Jinan, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.