How Does Green, Digital, Cross-Boundary Innovation Generate Synergistic Effects in Carbon Reduction?

Against the backdrop of rapid digitalization and greening, examining the impact of green, digital, cross-boundary innovation on carbon emissions is of critical importance for achieving carbon reduction more efficiently. This study uses data on Chinese listed companies from 2011 to 2022 as the sample and employs machine learning methods on patent texts to measure green, digital, cross-boundary innovation. A two-way fixed-effects model is applied to empirically examine its impact on carbon emissions. The results show that green, digital, cross-boundary innovation significantly reduces carbon emissions, with a carbon-reduction effect about 96% higher than that of traditional green technology innovation and showing some advantage over traditional digital technology innovation. Its mechanisms include enhancing green knowledge recombination, deeply embedding digital technologies, and improving resource allocation efficiency. The carbon-reduction effect is more pronounced in high-tech industries, highly competitive markets, and regions with stronger intellectual property protection and stricter environmental regulations. When differentiating among types of cross-boundary green innovation, green, digital, cross-boundary innovation reduces carbon emissions more effectively than non-digital, green, cross-boundary innovation and pure green technology innovation. Moreover, its carbon-reduction effect exhibits industry spillover and peer group effects. These findings provide valuable references for promoting the synergistic development of digitalization and greening and for leveraging innovation to achieve carbon reduction.