资源节约型城市创建、企业策略选择与水环境治理

Resource-saving City Creation,Corporate Strategy Choice and Water Environmental Governance

水环境是人类赖以生存的自然条件,实施全面节约战略,推进水资源节约与集约利用对于转变水资源使用方式,改善水环境质量以及实现“人水和谐”具有重要意义。文章基于企业策略选择视角,探究资源节约型城市创建的水环境治理效应及其作用机制。研究表明,资源节约型城市创建通过推动企业降低用水强度、加强技术改造以及发挥市场的“优胜劣汰”效应等机制有效抑制了污染排放行为,但不同企业在应对资源规制的策略选择上存在显著差异。具体而言,高耗水企业倾向于选择降低取水量和减产等非效率的方式应对规制目标,而非高耗水企业更希望通过提高重复用水率和增加废水治理设施数量等长效机制实现水环境治理。同时,资源节约型城市创建的水环境治理效应在重污染行业表现得更为显著。文章的研究有助于进一步识别企业应对资源规制的微观机制,为推动绿色发展,促进人与自然和谐共生提供重要启示。

Water resource shortage,water ecological damage and water environmental pollution have become bottleneck constraints to the construction of ecological civilization and sustainable economic and social development in China at present.Therefore,implementing a comprehensive conservation strategy and promoting the economical and intensive use of water resources are of great significance to achieve resource conservation and ecological environmental protection.To this end,this paper examines the water environmental governance effect of resource-saving city creation using a multi-period DID method based on the perspective of corporate strategy choice.The study shows that,resource-saving city creation effectively curbs polluting emissions through mechanisms such as promoting enterprises to reduce water consumption intensity,strengthening technological transformation,and bringing into play the market’s effect of winning and losing,but there are significant differences in the strategy choice of heterogeneous enterprises in response to resource regulation.Specifically,high water-consuming enterprises tend to choose inefficient ways to respond to regulation objectives,such as reducing water intake,cutting production,and withdrawing from the market;while nonhigh water-consuming enterprises are more interested in long-term mechanisms to achieve water environmental governance,such as increasing the reuse rate and increasing the number of wastewater treatment facilities.Further analysis shows that,the selection of“National Water-saving Cities”is a resource-saving competition,local government officials with strong political incentives will pay more attention to the coordinated development of“resource–economy–environment”,and the effect of water environment governance shows a distinct“race”motivation.At the same time,the water environmental governance effect is more significant in heavily-polluted industries,and the period effect of the policy decreases over time.The marginal contributions of this paper are as follows:First,it provides new ideas for achieving resource conservation and environmental protection through scientific assessment of the environmental governance effect of comprehensive resource regulation policies.Second,it innovatively explores the strategic choice of heterogeneous enterprises in achieving water environmental governance based on the dichotomous structure of high water-consuming industries and non-high water-consuming industries.Third,it advocates the concept of“water conservation is emission reduction;water conservation is pollution control”,focusing on the dual objectives of water conservation and water environmental protection by“combining”source prevention and end-of-pipe treatment.