Estimation of The Demand Function For El
Estimation of The Demand Function For El
Volume 11, Issue 11, November 2020, pp. 1679-1692. Article ID: IJM_11_11_160
Available online at http://www.iaeme.com/ijm/issues.asp?JType=IJM&VType=11&IType=11
Journal Impact Factor (2020): 10.1471 (Calculated by GISI) www.jifactor.com
ISSN Print: 0976-6502 and ISSN Online: 0976-6510
DOI: 10.34218/IJM.11.11.2020.160
ABSTRACT
The electricity sector is of strategic and vital importance sector represents the
backbone of economic, social and cultural growth, prosper and development of any
country. Consequently, electricity production and consumption become one of the
criteria for measuring the progress and development of nations and economic growth.
estimating the demand function for electricity in UAE is an important task because
demand of electricity is the main pillar of planning production and consumption of
electric energy to build successful policy in general and in UAE particular and it is
the core of this study were data during 1971-2018 are analyzed
Results shows that that prices of the electricity, population, population growth
rate, GDP, share of the sector in GDP of the household sector and the share of other
sector (sectors excluded the residential and commercial and industrial sectors) are
significantly affect the electricity demand in UAE while other factors have
insignificant affects. This is due to climate of the UAE and the coming labor to the
country.
Key words: factors affecting electricity, demand of electricity, electricity sector in
UAE.
Cite this Article: Akram Masoud Haddad, Estimation of the Demand Function for
Electricity the Case of UAE, International Journal of Management, 11(11), 2020,
pp 1679-1692.
http://www.iaeme.com/IJM/issues.asp?JType=IJM&VType=11&IType=11
1. INTRODUCTION
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is Federation consists of seven emirates with an area of
(86716 square kilometer), and total population of (9.6) millions at 2019. All authorities except
foreign affairs, defense, security and social services and adopt a common immigration policy,
are handled separately by each emirate and each contributes to building and protecting the
constitution as well as benefiting from its services. UAE is the eighth largest oil producer; the
oil wealth is directed to develop of the country. In addition to that, the location of the UAE in
the Middle East region of Asia, at the tip of the Arabian Peninsula, political and economic
stability, free and open economy well developed economies ensure robust competitive edge as
the region's premier commercial hub and second largest economy in the region. UAE
economic policies such as adoption of economic diversification program, free trade zones
which increase the contribution of non-oil sectors to GDP significantly. As a result, it became
one of most open and successful economies in the world and an important player in regional
and international affairs, and the third richest country in the world in terms of per capita
income. (Haddad, 2018)
The electricity sector is of strategic and vital importance sector represents the backbone of
economic, social and cultural growth, prosper and development of any country. Consequently,
electricity production and consumption become one of the criteria for measuring the progress
and development of nations and economic growth. Therefore, countries pay more attention,
and interest to this sector and invest more and more both in production and R&D in this
sector. (Bohna, 2015)
Electricity as commodity is characterized by the inability to be resold after purchased,
difficult to store and daily and seasonal fluctuated demand. The electricity market consists of
three interconnected and interdependent chains; those are generation, transmission, and
distribution to the end consumer chains. (Bouhna, 2015)
The supply side of electricity is characterized by huge capital intensity, huge fixed capital
investment, public owned firms, natural monopoly, the necessity to satisfy consumer needs
and raising the standard of living of the population, trade-off between utility and
environmental impact, price policy and welling of reduction of total costs by producers as
well as the international prices of the fuel.
Economic modeling of energy is very important tools for forecasting potential
developments or assessments of policy and market design options of the electricity that help
the policy maker.
Electricity is a very important in the gulf region in general and in UAE in particular due to
the prevailing hot climate, increase of population, the degree of civilization and as crucial
input for the growing and expending the industrial and commercial sectors. Therefore,
estimating the demand function for electricity in UAE is an important task because demand of
electricity is the main pillar of planning production and consumption of electric energy to
build successful policy in general and in UAE particular and it is the core of this study.
To achieve this objective the study tries to elaborate the following:
What is the situation and main features of the electricity sector in UAE?
What are the main factors that affecting the demand sector of the UAE?
What is the demand function for electricity in UAE for the main sectors?
This paper is organized as follows: the 1st section introduction, the 2nd section is revision
of literature and theoretical background. The 3rd section presents the methodology, data
collections, and the models of the study, while the 4th section present the situation of the
electricity sector in UAE and the 5th sector present the results of the data analysis. Finally, the
paper ends up with concluding remark and recommendations.
2. REVIEW OF LITERATURE
Electricity is most important energy sources and the key to humanity that contribute
substantially to other sectors and it drives the development process to progress. Electric one
essential goods for various activities, cannot be dispensed with because of their great
importance in the life of the various communities. (Omeran and Al-thalibi, 2015)
Electricity sector attracts the attention of scientist, economist, engineers as well as the
policy makers in general and the demand side of electricity is one of the main interest issues
for researchers to develop and provide plans for policy makers.
Several studies are done in most countries to estimate the demand functions of the
electricity, among those:
Amran and Abdulsalam, (2012) use some statistical methods to predict the demand for
electric power consumption in Saudi Arabia to reach the best model of electric power. The
study found that GDP, population and electricity consumption in the previous period are
positively affect the consumption of electric power in Saudi Arabia, and the consumption of
electric power grows by (32%) annually. In addition, the increase in economic development
and per capita income result in increase in demand for electric power.
Schulte, and Heindl (2016) study the price and income elasticities of residential electricity
and heating demand in Germany by applying a quadratic expenditure system, during the
period 1993-2008, the results show that the estimated expenditure for electricity is (0.3988)
and (0.4055) and the own price elasticity for electricity is (-0.4310) and (-0.5008) in the case
of space heating. In addition, expenditure and demographic composition disaggregation of
households reveals that the behavioral response to energy price changes is weaker (stronger)
for low-income (top-income) households. The study found that there are considerable
economies of scale in residential energy use, but scale effects are not well approximated by
the new Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OEDC) equivalence
scale. The real increases in energy prices show a regressive pattern of incidence, implying that
the welfare consequences of direct energy taxation are larger for low income households. The
application of zero-elasticities in assessments of welfare consequences of energy taxation
strongly underestimates potential welfare effects. The increase in inequality is 22% smaller
when compared to the application of rich and disaggregated behavioral response patterns.
Tawel, (2013) estimate the households demand function on electricity consumption in
Gaza Strip during 2000-2011, using the least squares method. The results showed that
variables greatly influenced and interpreted form by (2 = 99.3) due to privacy of Gaza, a lack
of commitment pay bills electricity service and expressed index total arrears annual
subscribers, and the average per capita income and rely on subscriptions collective and
expressed an average share of single contribution of electricity to the households where the
flexibility large as influenced positively in electricity consumption, which increased the
demand for electricity dramatically.
In Ukraine residential electricity tariffs are lower than production costs which lead to
higher industrial tariffs and need of government subsidies, that is why reduction of residential
electricity consumption became a great concern of the government. Thus, one of the main
policies aimed at reducing electricity consumption is increase the price of electricity. For that
Kozlova (2012) estimated the impact of electricity price on electricity consumption of urban
and rural population. In addition, as the problem of non-payments is still urgent in the
Commonwealth of Independent States (CSI), so that the impacts of debt accumulation is
considered. Results show that the urban population is much less responsive to the price
changes than rural population and the possibility of debt accumulation affects positively
electricity consumption and reduces the effect of price increase.
Khraief, Shahbaz, Mallick, and Loganathan (2016) estimated demand function of
electricity for Algeria, using economic growth, urbanization and trade openness in function
during 1971-2012.The results expose that income growth leads to higher electricity demand
along with urbanization which is another major contributing factor of rising electricity
demand and urbanization causes electricity use and electricity use causes urbanization. In
contrast, trade openness leads to reduce electricity demand. The empirical evidence indicates
the presence of the neutral effect between income growth and electricity use.
Shirani-Fakhr, Khoshakhlagh, and Alimorad (2015) estimating demand function for
electricity in industrial sector in Iran applying Structural Time Series Model (STSM) to
quarterly data during 2000-2011. Moreover, identifying the size and significance of the price
and output elasticities. The results indicate that the long-run and short-run industrial output
elasticities amounted to (0.85) and (0.36) respectively and the long-run and short-run
industrial energy price elasticities estimated at (-0.47) and (-0.27) respectively.
Kim, Kim and Yoo (2019) give evidence from South Korean manufacturing sector for
electricity demand function using cross-sectional data for analyzing the influence of
manufacturing firms’ characteristics. As sample of (946) observations collected from a
nationwide survey of manufacturing firms in 2018. As a robust approach, the least absolute
deviations estimation method is applied to obtaining the demand function. The results
illustrate that estimated price and the sales amount elasticities of the industrial electricity
demand are (0.9206) and (0.2568), respectively. Additionally, the economic benefits of
industrial electricity consumption are (1.46) times greater than as the price of electricity. This
can a tool for policy planning, making, and evaluation.
In Jordan, Al-Majali and Alrfua (2018) estimate demand for electricity consumption of the
household sector in Jordan Using VECM Model for the Period (1980 – 2015) This study
aims to estimate household demand function for electricity consumption in Jordan, using
quarterly data during the period (1980 -2015), the model of the study includes (Gross
Domestic Product (GDP), Per Capita, per capita electricity consume in the household sector,
the price of kilowatt/ hour weighted with consumer prices index (CPI), and the average degree
of temperature). The results indicate that there is a negative effect of prices of electric on
electricity consumed in the household sector, as well as there is a positive effect of per capita
income and temperatures on the electricity consumed. Those results afford some relevant
recommendations to policy makers such as keep on price discrimination policy as an incentive
to save energy.
In the same context, Al-Rawashdeh (2014) Estimate the Demand Function and identifying
the factors that affect electricity for family sector in Jordan during (1980-2012), the results
indicating that the family sector has the largest portion in electricity consumption and there
are large number of subscribers and shown that electricity demand is positively affected by
per capital income, while price and capital portion of electricity have negative effects.
Omer (2015) applying three-stage least squares (3SLS), Co-integration Method and Error
Correction model to estimate and determine the most important factors affecting the demand
and supply of electricity in Sudan during 1980-2014. Price, gross domestic product (GDP),
population and temperature and the volume of the Nile water, the amount and price of fuel
used for hydro generation, and the relative humidity are used in the model of the study. The
study concluded that there is a stable and balanced relationship in the long run, but from the
functions and determinants of demand and supply, GDP has great effect on the function of
demand of electricity in the short and long term and that it is possible to modify equilibrium error
in the short run with correction coefficient of -25.48 out of the its equilibrium value in the long
run. Electricity price has its effect on the function of supply in the short and long run with
correction coefficient of -.89 out of the equilibrium value in the long run.
In the same context, adopted the descriptive analytical approach, as well as the
econometrics method for model building. Omer and Alrasheed (2015) indicated that all the
coefficients of determination comply with the economic theory except the price, this may to
subsidized electricity prices by the government. In addition, the price elasticity of demand for
electricity amounts to (0.106) and (0.114) in the short and long run respectively, i.e., the
elasticity in the long run is higher than the elasticity in the short run, which is compatible with
Fisher model.
In the mean time Nakd, (2014) estimate long-term and short-term demand functions for
electricity of (residential, Industrial and Agricultural) sectors in Sudan during the period
(1984 2014) found that the function of demand for electricity in the residential sector function
depends on (the price of electricity for the residential sector, alternative electricity prices and
disposable income). The demand for electricity for the rindusterial sector depends on: price of
electricity to the industrial sector, alternative electricity prices, policy of economic
liberalization and contribution of industrial sector in GDP and function of demand for
electricity in agricultural sector depends on (price of electricity for the agricultural sector,
alternative electricity prices, policy of economic liberalization and contribution of industrial
sector in GDP).
3. METHODOLOGY
The demand for electricity depends on many variables differ according to sector under study.
Studies and pervious researches show that household sector depends on many variables, those
are price of electricity, disposable income, population, population growth rate, household size,
urban population percentage, and prices of electricity substitutes, climate factors (average
annual temperature, humidity, heating days, hot days) and the rate of economic growth. In
addition to contribution of sector to GDP, electricity prices for the sector, alternative
electricity prices, and the policy of economic liberalization are factors affecting the demand of
electricity in commercial, industrial agricultural sectors.
Availability of data on each of the mentioned variables is the main limitation to be
included into the demand function for any countries.
In this study the following econometric model is used.
DE = α +β1iINC +β2POP + β3POPGR +β4SGDPi+ β5GDP + β6PSi +β7GDPG+£i
Where:
DE Demand of electricity
INC income per captia
POP Absolute population
POPGR Population growth rate,
GDP Gross Domestic Product
GDPG economic growth rate
SGDP contribution of sector to GDP
PS electricity prices for the sector
The data are collected from different resources such as UNCTAD data base, The Federal
Competitiveness and Statistics Authority (FCSA), Arab Union of Electricity (AUE), The
world Bank database, the electricity companies in UAE websites and other sources during the
period 1970-2018.
(MW) in UAE by four companies during the period 2007-2018 and the percentage of the total
for each company.
The total installed capacity of electricity generation plants in UAE is increased annual
growth rate estimated at (5%), that is increased by (71.6%) during the period 2007-2018. This
increase is coming from the increase the installation of plants of the two big companies the
Abu Dhabi Water & Electricity Authority (ADWEA) (now Abu Dhabi DoE) and Dubai
Electricity & Water Authority (DEWA) (now EWEC) which both owned about (88.1%) of
the total installations capacity in UAE in 2017. Each of them owns about (54.7%) and
(33.6%) of the total installed capacity of electricity generation in UAE respectively, while the
other two companies the Sharjah Electricity & Water Authority (SEWA) and Federal
Electricity & Water Authority (FEWA) owned (9.9%) and (2.4%) of the total installation
capacity in UAE.
The table (1) shows that the installation capacity of the two big companies increased by
about (6.1%) and (5.9%) while Sharjah Electricity & Water Authority (SEWA) increased the
installation capacity by (1.9%) and Federal Electricity & Water Authority (FEWA) decreased
the capacity by (5.1%) annually during the period 2007-2018 and so that the share of the
company decreased from 7.1% to 2.3% of installed capacity of electricity generation plants in
UAE.
The production of Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) is increase by about
73.8% during the period 2007-2017.
The electricity produced by both Sharjah Electricity & Water Authority (SEWA) and
Federal Electricity & Water Authority (FEWA) dramatically decreased during the period
2007-2017, to reach about 4.4% and less than 0.4% of the total electricity production in UAE
in 2017 respectively. However, both the two companies cover only 5% of the total electricity
produced in UAE.
2011 5370 5.4 7729 7.8 86035 86.8 4 0.0 - - 99137 169.5
2012 5370 5.4 7729 7.8 86035 86.8 4 0.0 - - 99137 169.5
2013 5370 5.1 7729 7.3 86035 81.0 4 0.0 7084 6.7 106222 181.6
2014 6870 6.2 9365 8.5 88566 80.5 11 0.0 5167 4.7 109979 188.1
2015 7749 6.6 23266 20.0 85133 73.1 137 0.1 243 0.2 116528 199.3
2016 8468 6.6 25425 20.0 93022 73.0 163 0.1 288 0.2 127366 217.8
2017 8616 6.6 25870 20.0 94651 73.0 167 0.1 293 0.2 129597 221.6
2018 8646 6.4 26859 20.0 98271 73.0 173 0.1 304 0.2 134553 230.1
Growth -5.9 -11 -2.1 -7.4 1.7 -2.1 12.1 80.1 -40.8 5.7
Source: Calculated from Arab Union of Electricity, Statistical Bulletins.
household sector, (0.427) in the commercial sector, (0.018) millions consumers in industrial
sector and (0.085) millions consumers on other sectors in 2018.
Table (6) shows the distributions of the electricity consumption by sector in UAE during
the period 2004-2018. According to the table the electricity consumption increased from
about (50) thousand GWH in 2004 to (129.5) thousand GWh in 2018 that is two and half
folds of that in 2004.
The main consumer is the commercial sector which consumed about (56.3) thousands
GWh which is represent 43.5% of the total consumed electricity in 2018. The consumption of
the commercial sector shows an increase over the period 2004-2018 both in quantities and
percentage and increased from (18476) GWh and 36.3% of the total consumed electricity in
UAE in 2004 to (56302) GWh represents (43.5%) of the total electricity consumption in UAE
in 2018.
The second sector is residential or household sector which consume about 38.97
thousands GWh which represent (30.1%) of the total electricity in UAE in 2018, although
there are increase in the quantities consumed the share of this sector decrease from 34.3% in
2004 to 30.1% in 3018, this as result of the increase on consumptions of the other sectors.
Industrial sector electricity consumes (13.7) thousands GWh which is about 10.5% of the
total electricity consumption in 2018, however the consumption share shows show
fluctuations during the period 2004-2018.
The other sectors consumed (20.6) thousands GWh) which represent about 15.6% of the
total electricity consumption in UAE.
The prices of electricity is discriminated according to the sectors (residential, commercial,
industrial and government) and within the sector according to the amount of consumption
moreover prices of electricity is discriminate prices of residential sector between the type of
building (apartment or villa), however (DOE) also discriminate prices according to national
and non-national citizen. In addition, the prices differ from one Producer Company to another
especially for industrial and commercial sectors.
6. DEMAND ESTIMATION
To estimate the demand the data available during the period 1971-2018 is used for the main
variable used in the model of the study.
Table (8) shows the results of the demand function and the analysis of the factors that
affecting the electricity demand in UAE. The table indicates that prices of the electricity,
population, population growth rate, GDP, share of the sector in GDP of the household sector
and the share of other sector (sectors excluded the residential and commercial and industrial
sectors) are significantly affect the electricity demand in UAE while other factors have
insignificant affects.
As it usual the prices of electricity for all the three sectors negatively affect electricity
demand in UAE. However the value of the impact is very small (see the table), this may be
due to many reason such as the climate of the UAE considering that the temperature range
between (32-50 c), which means the necessity of electricity for air conditioning during all
over the year, and people can’t tolerate the high temperature as UAE is the second Arab
country in per capita consumption of electricity in addition to that low prices of electricity as
it is mentioned above and the value of total consumption is very low related to the high
income of the people.
The GDP positively affect the demand of the electricity and everyone million US$ of
GDP will cause about (0.145962) TWh increase in electricity demand. This also due to wide
use of the electricity about 70% in the production sectors such as commercial, industrial and
other sectors which generate the GDP in UAE considering that the UAE is great trade center
in the middle east and Gulf region. In the same context the share of both the Household share
in GDP and the share of other sectors in GDP significantly affect the demand of electricity In
UAE, but in different way so that the share of other sectors (government, agriculture,,, etc. )
in GDP positively affect the demand of electricity while the Household share in GDP
negatively affect the demand. In the contrary the share of commercial and industrial sectors
has insignificant affect.
The impact of the increase in the population number affect the demand of electricity in
UAE and everyone thousand population increase the demand by (5.679699) GWh, this as
those new people need to electricity for air conditioning and other house electronic
instruments. In the contrary the population Annual average growth rate negatively affect the
demand of electricity by (4038.7) GWh this may due to the fact that the population growth
rate decrease during the past decades after it reach about (14%) due to the foreign labor
coming to work in UAE and it decrease to reach about (1.5%) which is the normal growth
rate.
REFERENCES
[1] Haddad, A. M. (2018). The impacts of the inwards and outwards FDI on the development
measured by HDI: The case of United Arab Emirate. International Journal of Economics And
Financial Issues, 8(4), 301-312.
[2] Al-Majali, A., & Alrfua, A. (2018). Estimate demand for electricity consumption of the
household sector in Jordan using VECM model for the period (1980–2015). Jordanian J Econ
Sci, 5(1), 19.
[3] Amal Husni Al-Rawashdeh (2014) Estimate the Demand Function to Electricity for Family
Sector In Jordan During (1980-2012) Mutah University,2014
[4] Arman, K., Thalebe. S., (2015), estimation of electric power demand in the province of Basra
1995-2010, Agaei journal for economic and business sciences, 9(32), 104-134
[5] Arman, K., Zalaan. A., (2012) Using Some Statistical Methods to Predict the Demand for
Electric Power Consumption in Saudi Arabia, Economic Sciences 8 (29), 261-297
[6] Bouhna, Kalthoum and Benazza Mohamed (2015) the Reality of the Electricity Sector in
Algeria, Case Study of the Sonelgaz Complex, the Algerian Journal of Globalization and
Economic Policies, 6(1) 119-139
[7] Khraief, N., Shahbaz, M., Mallick, H., & Loganathan, N. (2018). Estimation of electricity
demand function for Algeria: revisit of time series analysis. Renewable and Sustainable
Energy Reviews, 82, 4221-4234.
[8] Kim, H. J., Kim, G. S., & Yoo, S. H. (2019). Demand Function for Industrial Electricity:
Evidence from South Korean Manufacturing Sector. Sustainability, 11(18), 5112
[9] Kozlova, A. (2012). Response of residential electricity demand to price changes in
Ukraine. Kyiv School of Economics.
[10] Krysiak, F. C., & Weigt, H. (2015). The demand side in economic models of energy markets:
the challenge of representing consumer behavior. Frontiers in Energy Research, 3, 24.
[11] Mona, N., (2014) Estimating Demand Functions for Electricity of Economic Sectors in Sudan
for the period (1984 2014), Ph.d research
[12] Omer, M., (2015) Econometrics Models of functions for Demand and Supply of Electricity
Commodity in Sudan by Using Co-integration Method and Error Correction model (1980-
2014) Ph,D thesis.
[13] Omer, M., Rasheed, T., (2016) Estimation Of the Determinates Of Electricity Demand in
Sudan during (1980-2014), Journal of Economic Sciences, 17(1) 42-58
[14] Schulte, I., & Heindl, P. (2017). Price and income elasticities of residential energy demand in
Germany. Energy Policy, 102, 512-528.
[15] Shirani-Fakhr, Z., Khoshakhlagh, R., & Sharifi, A. (2015). Estimating Demand Function For
Electricity In Industrial Sector Of Iran Using Structural Time Series Model (Stsm). Applied
Econometrics and International Development, 15(1), 143-160.
[16] Tawel, F., (2013) Estimating Househlds Demand Function On Electricity Consumption In
Palestine Case Study: Gaza Strip (2000-2011). Estimating Househlds Demand Function On
Electricity Consumption In Palestine Case Study: Gaza Strip (2000-2011).
[17] https://www.export.gov/article?id=United-Arab-Emirates-Conventional-Power
[18] Federal Competitiveness and Statistics Authority, United Arab Emirates; 2017
(https://fcsa.gov.ae/en-us/Pages/Statistics/Statistics.aspx, accessed 5 March 2020)
[19] Arab Union of Electricity, Statistical Bulletin, Different years, at the website
http://www.auptde.org/Publications.aspx?lang=en&CID=36
[20] World Bank, World Bank database