title: Estimating elasticity for residential electricity demand in China.
abstract: Residential demand for electricity is estimated for China using a unique household level dataset. Household electricity demand is specified as a function of local electricity price, household income, and a number of social-economic variables at household level. We find that the residential demand for electricity responds rather sensitively to its own price in China, which implies that there is significant potential to use the price instrument to conserve electricity consumption. Electricity elasticities across different heterogeneous household groups (e.g., rich versus poor and rural versus urban) are also estimated. The results show that the high income group is more price elastic than the low income group, while rural families are more price elastic than urban families. These results have important policy implications for designing an increasing block tariff.
authors.affiliation: Department of Techno-Economic Research, Development Research Center of the State Council, Beijing 10010, China.
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Shi
authors.forename: X
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Song
mesh_terms: D002681:China; D003246:Conservation of Energy Resources / Q000191:economics; D004560:Electricity; D004736:Energy-Generating Resources / Q000191:economics*; D058735:Environmental Policy; D005191:Family Characteristics; D007182:Income; D012424:Rural Population; D014505:Urban Population