Under the promotion of the "dual carbon"(carbon peaking and carbon neutrality) goal, the concept of low-carbon economic development and green transformation of enterprises are increasingly deeply rooted in people’s hearts, and promoting the construction of ESG system has become an important way to promote green transformation of enterprises. This article first analyzes the development status of ESG performance of listed manufacturing enterprises in China, and then uses methods such as bidirectional fixed effects, heterogeneity analysis, and transmission mechanism testing to empirically analyze the impact of ESG performance of listed manufacturing enterprises on green innovation. The results show that ESG performance of listed manufacturing enterprises has a significant promoting effect on green innovation, and can promote green innovation through intermediary effects such as digital transformation, enhancing corporate reputation, and reducing financing costs. Besides, this article provides policy recommendations, that is, actively encouraging listed manufacturing companies to improve their ESG performance through information disclosure, further promoting their institutional construction of ESG performance and green innovation, actively encouraging digital transformation, enhancing corporate reputation, and reducing financing costs, etc.