Spatial Pattern and Spillover Effects of the Urban Land Green Use Efficiency for the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration of the Yellow River Basin

Green development is necessary for building high-quality modern economic systems. Due to limited land resources, ensuring the ecological benefits will not be damaged while developing the economy is necessary, as is improving urban land green use efficiency (ULGUE). Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration is a crucial urban agglomeration in the upper reaches of the Yellow River Basin. The improvement of ULGUE can promote the integrated management of the region’s land and achieve harmonious development with the social economy. This study adopts a super-efficiency SBM model to quantify the ULGUE of the Lanzhou-Xining urban agglomeration between 2015 and 2020, analysing its spatial and temporal patterns by combining exploratory spatial data analysis. The spatial spillover effect was discussed using the spatial Durbin model. The results showed that the average value of ULGUE in the study period was on the rise and showed positive spatial autocorrelation. The ULGUE of provincial capital cities was higher than non, along with the efficiency of city proper, compared to other counties. Many factors were found to positively influence the ULGUE of the whole study region. Among these were the optimisation of industrial structure, economic development, urbanisation level, and government intervention. Population concentration and environmental regulation had a negative spatial spillover effect.