Can the digital economy empower urban energy resource transition? A natural gas perspective

The diffusion effect of the digital economy (DEN) has become increasingly prominent, but few scholars have investigated the energy transition effect of China’s DEN. To this end, this study takes 207 cities in China as the research object to explore the potential role of DEN development in boosting energy resource transition (ERT). The endogeneity and asymmetry between variables are also analyzed. We find that (i) China’s urban DEN and ERT show a synchronized fluctuating upward trend from 2006 to 2019; (ii) both DEN and ERT show significant positive nexus; put differently, the rapid evolution of DEN can significantly help enhance the strength of ERT; and (iii) substantial heterogeneity exists at different quantiles. In 10th and 90th quantiles, the impacts of DEN on ERT are insignificant, and both DEN and ERT exhibit significant positive linkage in 25th, 50th, and 75th quantiles. To this end, we put forward corresponding policy recommendations to boost ERT from the perspective of DEN.