--- title: "The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Urban Green Total Factor Productivity—Evidence from Chinese Cities · AI Fault Line" url: https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-3390-su18115616/ description: "AI Fault Line is a neutral, evidence-cited field guide to why experts looking at the same developments disagree about AI's effect on productivity, jobs, inequality, regulation and the pace of change." --- [Research](https://aifaultline.com/research/) # The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Urban Green Total Factor Productivity—Evidence from Chinese Cities X. B. Wang, Minghuan Wu, Yuan Feng, Liang Zhao · Sustainability · 2 Jun 2026 [Read original source](https://doi.org/10.3390/su18115616) Open access Where this sits in the debate - [Will AI actually boost productivity and growth?](https://aifaultline.com/debate/productivity/) · its finding supports the claim ([why studies differ](https://aifaultline.com/debate/productivity/#why)) Direction of the finding as read from the abstract by an AI model ([AI-written](https://aifaultline.com/about/)). ## Abstract Green total factor productivity (GTFP) plays an important role in urban sustainability. In the context of rapid advances in artificial intelligence (AI), this study examines whether and how the accumulation of AI technologies affects urban GTFP. We construct a city-level AI development index based on patent data. Using panel data on 120 Chinese prefecture-level cities from 2010 to 2023, we employ two-way fixed-effects models, instrumental-variables estimation, and multiple robustness checks to identify the impact of AI on urban GTFP. The results show that AI significantly improves urban GTFP. A one-standard-deviation increase in AI development is associated with an increase of approximately 0.75 in GTFP, which represents a substantial improvement within the distribution of GTFP. Mechanism analysis indicates that this effect operates primarily through green innovation and industrial upgrading. The positive impact is more pronounced in cities with stronger economic and institutional foundations. ## About this publication **Academic journal.** Published in an academic journal — typically peer-reviewed before publication, though indexing alone doesn't guarantee review depth. Published 2026 (5 months ago) Citations 0 (OpenAlex) 0 citations recorded by OpenAlex — too few 2026 papers in this collection for a fair comparison. [Chart: published 2026] ## More on this topic Related by theme, not necessarily by method or conclusion. - [Navigating the Jagged Technological Frontier: Field Experimental Evidence of the Effects of AI on Knowledge Worker Productivity and Quality](https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-2139-ssrn-4573321/) SSRN · 2023 - [Generative AI at Work](https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-1093-qje-qjae044/) The Quarterly Journal of Economics · 2025 - [The Impact of AI on Developer Productivity: Evidence from GitHub Copilot](https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-48550-arxiv-2302-06590/) arXiv · 2023 - [The Productivity J-Curve: How Intangibles Complement General Purpose Technologies](https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-1257-mac-20180386/) American Economic Journal Macroeconomics · 2020 Overview assembled automatically from collected metadata. [How this site is built](https://aifaultline.com/about/).