Features of Electricity Consumption During the Economic Development Phase

Abstract

Economic development can be divided into different stages. Generally speaking, economists are accustomed to use per capita GDP as the main index for judging the economic development phase of a country or region. As we discussed in the previous chapters, electricity consumption is positive correlated with GDP. Can we use per capita electricity consumption and per capita residential electricity consumption as indexes for judging the economic development phase of a country/region? What are the electricity consumption features during different economic development phases? Comparing with Chenery’s model, we will study datum line models for the different economic stages by using per capita electricity consumption and per capita household electricity use in this chapter. Case studies for the United States and Japan show their models in the economic development. Since there are 31 provinces in China, the economic stages of the individual provinces will be discussed in this chapter.