Despite the growing interest in environmental innovations, there is still no consensus about their effect on firm performance. On the one hand, advocators of environmental innovations state that such innovations exert a positive influence on firm performance, as they can reduce production costs, open new markets and improve a firm's corporate image, among other benefits. On the other hand, environmental innovations are associated with relevant drawbacks such as high development costs and uncertainties, leading some authors to establish a negative relationship. We try to shed light on this debate by stating that this relation is more complex than a simple linear association; hence, we propose an inverted U relationship between environmental innovations and firm performance. In addition, we claim that firm age plays a key role in that relationship, as more mature firms find it more difficult than younger firms to capitalize on environmental innovations to improve firm performance. Our longitudinal analysis of 4,634 environmental patents from 75 companies belonging to the electrical components and equipment industry worldwide confirms our hypotheses.

尽管人们对环境创新的兴趣日益浓厚，但对于它们对公司绩效的影响仍未达成共识。一方面，环境创新的倡导者表示，此类创新对企业绩效产生积极影响，因为它们可以降低生产成本、开辟新市场、改善企业形象等好处。另一方面，环境创新与高开发成本和不确定性等相关缺陷相关，导致一些作者建立负相关。我们试图通过说明这种关系比简单的线性关联更复杂来阐明这场辩论。因此，我们提出了环境创新和企业绩效之间的倒 U 关系。此外，我们声称公司年龄在这种关系中起着关键作用，因为更成熟的公司发现比年轻的公司更难利用环境创新来提高公司绩效。我们对全球 75 家电气元件和设备行业公司的 4,634 项环境专利的纵向分析证实了我们的假设。