Urban Renewal to Promote the Green Intensive Use of Land: Empirical Evidence from China

Urban land green use efficiency (ULGUE), which directly impacts sustainable economic and social development as well as people’s well-being, has garnered significant attention. This study employed a difference-in-differences model to assess how urban renewal influences ULGUE and its underlying mechanisms, analyzing panel data from 2006 to 2019 for 283 Chinese cities. The key findings include the following: (1) Urban renewal notably catalyzed improvements in ULGUE. Rigorous analyses of robustness further corroborated this outcome. On average, cities implementing urban renewal witnessed a substantial increase of 6.74% in ULGUE compared to those without such initiatives. (2) Urban renewal had a significant impact on ULGUE in the eastern and southern regions, large cities, and non-resource-dependent cities. Conversely, this impact was absent in the central and western regions, northern areas, small cities, and resource-centric cities. (3) Urban renewal’s contribution to the enhancement of ULGUE stemmed primarily from its effects on innovation and economic agglomeration. Urban innovation was measured by the number of green invention patent applications per 10,000 individuals, while economic agglomeration was assessed using the nonagricultural industrial added value over the administrative land area of the city. This study provides empirical evidence for the sustainable use of urban land in China from the perspective of urban renewal, offering important insights for countries at advanced stages of urbanization or those approaching such stages. Implementing urban renewal strategies similar to those adopted in China may contribute to the sustainable use of land globally.