Digital and Green Transitions: Opportunities and Challenges for Europe and China

The digital and green transitions are crucial to the competitiveness of Europe and China. To strengthen their innovation efforts in this direction, it is essential to develop a technology ecosystem that promotes transdisciplinary research and combines digital and green knowledge. This chapter explores how the knowledge base in ‘twin’ digital and green technologies is developing in the European Union, the United Kingdom and China in comparison with other major players on the global technology scene such as the United States, Japan and South Korea. It investigates the Chinese policy programmes adopted to strengthen the knowledge base in this key area and analyses green digital patents. We conclude that Europe has an advantage over China in most of the twin transition technological areas investigated, but Europe has a few leading edges in the wider global landscape. The chapter emphasises the need for both competition and collaboration between the EU and China in driving the global sustainability goals with these technologies, which calls for ambitious public policies and collaborative efforts to address the challenges in greening digital technologies.