Energy consumption flow and regional economic development: evidence from 25 economies
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to figure out the relationship between energy consumption flow from a new perspective of embodied energy inventory index (EEII) and regional economic growth.
Design/methodology/approach
The input-output approach has been applied to calculate embodied energy inventory (EEI) and EEII using the data of 25 economies. Meanwhile, cluster analysis and panel data modeling were applied to carry out detailed research.
Findings
The results of cluster analysis show that there is a roughly negative relationship between EEII and gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, although there are some exceptions, such as Russia and Taiwan (Province of China). Panel data model results provide further evidence that there is a negative relationship between EEII and GDP per capita. Population is an important productive factor in the regional economic development. The study showed a positive relationship between EEII and population. Therefore, energy consumption flow is closely related to regional economic development.
Originality/value
The value of this paper is to use EEI and EEII to comprehensively clarify the energy consumption flow. The advantage of EEII is that it can reflect the energy embodied in fixed assets and infrastructure.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to the financial support of the National Natural Science Foundation (Grant No. 71273031), Beijing Natural Science Foundation (Grant No. 9152014) and Basic Research Foundation of Beijing Institute of Technology (Grant No. 20132116042).
The authors sincerely appreciate Professor Yi-ming Wei for his kind guidance and highly constructive suggestions during the early conception, writing and polishing of this paper. The authors would like to thank Hua-nan Li, Hong Cao, Zhi-fu Mi, Hao Yu, Hao Chen and Jia-yin Yin for their beneficial assistance. They are also thankful for the support and help provided by CEEP-BIT colleagues.
Citation
Tang, B.-j., Gong, P.-q., Xiao, Y.-c. and Wang, H.-y. (2017), "Energy consumption flow and regional economic development: evidence from 25 economies", Journal of Modelling in Management, Vol. 12 No. 1, pp. 96-118. https://doi.org/10.1108/JM2-09-2014-0074
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2017, Emerald Publishing Limited