Research on the Impact of Environmental Regulations on Green Performance of Biosafety Laboratory Construction Projects

Biosafety laboratory construction projects are characterized by high technical complexity, strict safety requirements, and potential environmental risks, making the improvement of their green performance essential for both biosafety governance and sustainable construction. However, existing studies have paid insufficient attention to how different types of environmental regulation influence green performance in this specialized construction context. To address this gap, this study investigates the effects of command-and-control, market-incentive, and public-participation environmental regulation on three dimensions of green performance: green process innovation, green management innovation, and environmental performance. Three hypotheses were proposed to examine these relationships. Based on 372 valid questionnaire responses from professionals and enterprises involved in biosafety laboratory construction projects in China, this study used SPSS 27.0 and AMOS 26.0 to conduct reliability and validity tests, confirmatory factor analysis, structural equation modeling, and supplementary regression analysis. The results show that command-and-control environmental regulation significantly promotes green process innovation, green management innovation, and environmental performance, with standardized path coefficients of 0.316, 0.250, and 0.200, respectively. Public-participation environmental regulation has stronger positive effects on the three dimensions, with standardized path coefficients of 0.888, 0.874, and 0.808, respectively. In contrast, market-incentive environmental regulation does not significantly affect green process innovation, green management innovation, or environmental performance. These findings indicate that mandatory regulatory requirements and public-participation mechanisms are more effective than current market-based incentives in improving the green performance of biosafety laboratory construction projects. This study enriches research on environmental regulation and green performance in specialized infrastructure projects and provides practical implications for strengthening environmental governance, public participation, and incentive policy design in biosafety laboratory construction.