Exploring the Relationship between China’s Digital Village Development and Green Energy Consumption among Farmhouseholds: Mechanisms, Evidence, and Policy
Against the backdrop of the “dual carbon” strategy, promoting the green transformation of rural energy consumption structures is a critical issue for achieving sustainable rural development. This paper systematically reviews the literature on the relationship between digital village development and farmers’ green energy consumption from three dimensions: theoretical mechanisms, empirical evidence, and policy interventions. Information empowerment holds a fundamental position in driving the green energy consumption transformation among farmers. By resolving information asymmetry and reshaping cognitive frameworks to activate endogenous demand. Findings reveal: First, digital village development drives the transition toward cleaner and more efficient energy consumption among farmers through multiple pathways. These include boosting income and alleviating mobility constraints, reducing search costs and information asymmetry, improving energy accessibility, leveraging peer effects and demonstration effects, and enhancing digital literacy. Second, household energy choice behavior exhibits complex decision-making characteristics, jointly constrained by economic factors such as income constraints, price effects, and resource endowments, as well as non-economic factors including transaction costs, cognitive biases, and behavioral inertia. Third, digital technology adoption significantly promotes clean energy uptake among households, though its effects exhibit heterogeneity across regions, income levels, and education levels. Fourth, policy interventions play a crucial role in driving energy transition. The existing policy framework suffers from a core theoretical flaw, overemphasizing an “economic incentives-driven” logic that mistakenly treats farmers as perfectly rational economic agents, resulting in policy effectiveness falling short of expectations. Economic incentives, information disclosure, infrastructure development, and behavioral nudges each have distinct advantages and limitations, necessitating tailored combinations based on local conditions. This paper identifies gaps in existing research—including insufficient exploration of micro-level mechanisms, lack of long-term impact assessments, and weak studies on policy coordination—and proposes future research directions. It provides theoretical insights and policy implications for advancing the organic integration of digital rural development and green energy transition.
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