How does supply chain digitalization enhance energy resilience? Empirical evidence from listed companies in China

Abstract

Strengthening energy resilience holds strategic importance for national energy security. As digital technologies increasingly integrate with supply chains, it is imperative to understand the mechanisms and impacts of this digitalization on energy resilience. This understanding is vital for ensuring energy security, advancing supply-side structural reforms, and fostering a new development paradigm. Drawing from an exogenous shock environment induced by the digitization of logistics processes and case studies, this study systematically evaluates the influence of logistical digitalization on corporate energy resilience. It does this by analyzing A-share company information between 2007 and 2022. The findings reveal that supply chain digitalization (SCD) markedly bolsters corporate energy resilience. Specifically, energy efficiency enhancement and green empowerment emerge as primary pathways through which digitalization improves corporate energy resilience. Furthermore, robust management practices and a conducive business setting for supply chains, facilitated by government interventions, are essential supporting conditions. Heterogeneity analysis further underscores that SCD's positive effects on energy resilience are especially evident in state-owned enterprises, non-high-tech firms, non-resource-based businesses, and growing entities. This research not only substantiates the need for expedited modernization of the supply chain system and assurance of energy security but also offers valuable policy insights for augmenting the resilience of industrial and supply chains, thereby fostering significant qualitative and quantitative economic growth.