Comprehensive utilization level of the coal industry and its influencing factors in coal resource-based cities

As an important energy resource in China, improving the comprehensive utilization level of coal is a key proposition for promoting high-quality development. This paper taking the coal industry in coal resource-based cities as the research object, depicting the comprehensive utilization status of the industry from multiple dimensions based on the national mining and coal industry data from 2012 to 2021. Firstly, analyzing the status of comprehensive utilization of China’s coal industry. During the sample year period, the overall trend of the comprehensive utilization output value of the national mining industry is basically consistent with that of the comprehensive utilization output value of the coal industry. Meanwhile, the proportion of their comprehensive utilization output value in the total industrial output value maintained a consistent change trend, and the proportion of the coal industry’s comprehensive utilization output value in the total industrial output value is relatively low. Secondly, taking the comprehensive utilization output value as the dependent variable, and selecting the number of employees in coal mines, designed mining capacity, and sales income of mineral products as independent variables, a two-way fixed effects model is constructed, and regional heterogeneity analysis is carried out. The study finds that mine scale with designed mining capacity as a proxy variable and mineral product income, as core influencing factors, have a positive impact on the comprehensive utilization output value; the results of heterogeneity analysis conducted by region show that the differences in influencing factors among the eastern, central and western regions are mainly concentrated in the impacts of designed mining capacity and sales income of mineral products on the comprehensive utilization output value. Heterogeneity investigation based on the type of resource-based cities reveals that the comprehensive utilization output value of coal resource-exhausted cities has a stronger correlation with the total industrial output value. This study provides empirical evidence for the improvement of the comprehensive utilization output value of the coal industry in the future.