Environmental performance, innovation and spillovers. Evidence from a regional NAMEA

The achievement of positive Environmental Performance (EP) at national level could strongly depend on differences in regional features, namely productive specialization, regulation stringency and innovation capabilities of both public institutions and the private business sector. We present empirical evidence for a newly released NAMEA available for the 20 Italian regions in order to demonstrate the role played by sector innovation, regional spillovers and environmental policies. The Italian North–south divide regarding industrial development and productive specialization patterns seems to affect regional EP. Nonetheless, such a pattern presents some interesting differences, revealing a more heterogeneous distribution of emissions which may reflect the role of other driving forces. In particular, agglomerative effects seem to play a major role and the EP of neighboring regions influences the regional internal EP. This means that together with the spatial concentration of specific sectors into restricted areas, there is also some convergence in the adoption of cleaner or dirtier production process techniques. Finally, interregional technological spillovers are more important than sector internal innovation for improving EP, revealing that accounting for spatial features and linking ecological economics to regional economics are crucial in understanding the key drivers of EP.