Beyond end-of-pipe: The role of computing power deployment in fostering corporate source control green innovation

In the era of AI, optimizing computing power deployment has emerged as a key engine driving corporate green innovation. This study uses Chinese listed companies as research samples to examine how computing power deployment influences enterprises' source control green innovation. The results show that computing power deployment facilitates the digital-intelligence convergence technology, improves innovation efficiency, accelerates industry-university-research collaboration, and thereby strengthens enterprises' level of source control green innovation. Heterogeneity analysis shows that the promoting effect of computing power deployment on source control green innovation is stronger for certified enterprises located in national computing power hub cities, certified enterprises whose business locations match their registered addresses, as well as high-polluting and high-tech enterprises. In terms of endogeneity treatment, this study uses the product of the shortest distance from the firm's city to node cities of China's fiber optic backbone network and a time trend term as an instrumental variable for two-stage least squares (2SLS). The baseline findings remain robust, excluding the influence of endogeneity. Further analysis reveals that computing power deployment has no effect on end-of-pipe treatment green innovation. This study investigates the influencing factors of corporate source control green innovation, offering theoretical insights for enterprises to better leverage computing power resources and pursue green, high-quality development.