Digital empowerment for green: the impact of supply chain digitalization and enterprise energy efficiency

Improving energy efficiency in the supply chain is now a crucial component in advancing sustainable development. As a motivational force, digital technology offers new opportunities to optimise energy consumption throughout the supply chain. Based on the data of Chinese A-share listed enterprises from 2010 to 2022, this paper takes the supply chain digitalization pilot policy as an exogenous shock and uses the difference-in-difference method to thoroughly investigate the impact of supply chain digitalization on enterprise’s supply chain energy efficiency (SCEE). The research finds that supply chain digitalization can significantly improve an enterprise’s SCEE, and its promoting effect is more pronounced in non-heavily polluting, capital-intensive, and technology-intensive enterprises. In addition, the mechanism analysis results show that by enhancing the industrial concentration and innovation capability, supply chain digitalization can effectively promote the improvement of SCEE. Further analysis shows that firms’ productivity plays a positive moderating role, while environmental uncertainty plays a negative moderating role. Our findings offer enterprises a theoretical framework for advancing the sustainable transformation.