Sustainable innovation cooperation for new energy vehicles under technological innovation risks and dual credit policy

The rapid growth of new energy vehicles (NEVs) provides a promising pathway to mitigate environmental degradation and alleviate energy shortages. To accelerate this transition, China has introduced the dual credit policy, a market-driven mechanism designed to incentivize technological innovation. However, most studies implicitly assume successful innovation outcomes, overlooking the substantial risk of innovation failure that characterizes NEV supply chains. This study develops decision-making models that incorporate innovation risk and examines three scenarios-no innovation, independent innovation, and cooperative innovation-to derive optimal innovation strategies and cooperation conditions. Results show that while the dual credit policy effectively promotes innovation, its incentive impact is significantly weakened when innovation risk is high. Cost-sharing mechanisms can alleviate this adverse effect, as the policy increases manufacturers’ willingness to share innovation costs, thereby facilitates cooperative technological innovation. Moreover, higher credit prices or credit coefficients further expand the manufacturer’s cost-sharing coefficients, enhancing the feasibility of sustained cooperation. These findings highlight that integrating innovation risk considerations into policy design, together with well-structured cost-sharing arrangements, offers a feasible pathway for advancing NEV innovation in line with global sustainability goals.