Feeling the pulse of carbon emissions trading: How market-based climate policy shapes energy resilience

Amid escalating geopolitical frictions, exemplified by the Russia-Ukraine conflict, along with intensified global endeavors toward net-zero emissions, the urgency of strengthening energy resilience has become increasingly evident. While existing research on carbon emissions trading (CET) primarily focuses on its short-term environmental effects, its long-term implications for energy resilience remain underexplored. This study investigates the long-term impacts, underlying mechanisms, and regional heterogeneity of China’s carbon emissions trading scheme, a flagship market-based environmental policy, on energy resilience. Our findings reveal that CET significantly strengthens energy resilience in pilot regions, underscoring its positive externalities beyond emissions reduction. These results are robust across multiple sensitivity checks. Mechanism analysis indicates that CET strengthens energy resilience by fostering technological innovation and facilitating energy structure optimization. Furthermore, the impact is more pronounced in municipalities, less industrialized regions, and areas with higher levels of informatization, underscoring the critical roles of local capacity and structural context. Overall, this study yields robust empirical evidence on the broader benefits of market-based environmental regulation and offers actionable insights for designing carbon policies that accelerate energy system transformation and promote sustainable development.