Greener Policies, Brighter Innovations? The Real Effect of Government's Environmental Attention on Innovation in New Energy Industry

Under the global “Sustainable Development Goals” direction, the energy industry, as an environment-friendly and highly technology-intensive industry, has become a key starting point for countries around the world to take into account the economy and the environment. As the key elements of global development and transformation, new energy industry’s innovation has always been a key area of academic research. This paper scrutinizes the governmental work assessments of prefectural-level 273 Chinese cities spanning from 2011 to 2020, employing Tobit regression, mediating effect model, moderating effect model alongside nonlinear regression analysis to explore the relation between governmental environmental attention (Gov) and innovation of the new energy industry (PA), alongside the potential mechanism and heterogeneities. The findings indicate that: (1) Gov exerts a notable contribution to fostering innovation in the new energy sector, characterized by a nonlinear relationship resembling an inverted "U" shape (turning point 0.033); (2) Mechanism analysis showed that public environmental concern played a partial mediating role, the intensity of function is: 35.27% and economic policy uncertainty plays an important moderating role; (3) The influence of Gov on PA demonstrates obvious regional heterogeneity and stage heterogeneity. (4) Gov exerts a more discernible facilitating influence on incremental innovation compared with breakthrough innovation.