Can new-type infrastructure lead to regional green well-being? Evidence from China.

Abstract

New-type infrastructure has an increasingly important role to play in realizing green well-being. By employing China's prefecture-level data from 2003 to 2021, we explore the influence of new-type infrastructure on green well-being and its impact mechanism. The results show that new-type infrastructure significantly improves regional green well-being (even under the presence of robustness tests and without policy intervention). Theoretically, new-type infrastructure can generate the leading effect of residents' demand, the promoting effect of industrial structure, and the guarantee mechanism of environmental governance which in turn, improve regional green well-being. Findings also confirm that new-type infrastructure may substantially boost household income, promote economic serviceability, and enhance green governance capacity. The green well-being effects of new-type infrastructure also display regional heterogeneity which tend to be greater in cities with well-designed digital infrastructure and low-carbon development. Finally, economic density and innovation may result in regime changes in the green well-being effects of new-type infrastructure. These findings offer insights and implications for regional green well-being development.