Exploring the role of environmental regulation on energy security: Contextual findings for sustainable development in Chinese provinces

Recently, with the reduction of energy resources and the emergence of problems such as unreasonable use, the issue of energy security has gradually received increased attention. As an important tool to pro-tect the energy environment and promote national economic transformation, it is important to investi-gate the relationship between environmental regulation and energy security to ensure energy security. Here, we measure the level of energy security by region based on provincial panel data, empirically ana-lyze the direct and spillover effects and spatial heterogeneity of environmental regulation on energy security, and also explore the non-linear characteristics of environmental regulation on energy security driven by fiscal decentralization and marketization. The results show that there are regional differences and spatial dependence in China's energy security, indicating that environmental regulation contributes to the level of energy security, but the effect of environmental regulation varies across regions and the positive impact of environmental regulation is enhanced when the degree of fiscal decentralization and marketization crosses a specific threshold. Finally, the paper puts forward relevant policy recommendations.CO 2023 International Association for Gondwana Research. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.