Does green finance achieve its goal of promoting coordinated development of economy–environment? Using the pollutant emission efficiency as a proxy.

This study attempts to explore the issue of whether green finance can achieve its goal of promoting coordinated development of the economy–environment, through taking the pollutant emission efficiency as a proxy. Using the panel data of 30 provinces in China from 2010 to 2020, based on calculating the indexes of green finance and pollutant emission efficiency, effects of green finance on pollutant emission efficiency are explored, and the spatial spillover process and its characteristics in the transformation progression of green finance are also identified; results show that: (1) green finance can effectively improve the pollutant emission efficiency nationwide, and there is regional heterogeneity in the impact of green finance, the strongest effect exists in the North and East, while the Northwest and Southwest behave more extreme heterogeneity of pollutant types; (2) green finance also produces a strong spillover effect on improving the economic-environment relationship in neighboring areas; also, there are significant regional differences in the spatial spillover effects of green finance; it is the Northwest and East that show the strongest effects; (3) there are noticeable geographic attenuation processes of green finance's pollutant emission spillover effects, including geographic attenuation boundary and influence dense areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Environment, Development & Sustainability is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)