Calculation of tourist sector electricity consumption and its cost in subsidised insular electrical systems: The case of the Canary Islands, Spain

Ignacio Nuez and Javier Osorio

Energy Policy, 2019, vol. 132, issue C, 839-853

Abstract: The Canary Islands is a European archipelago whose principal economic activity is international tourism. Due to its geographic isolation, it does not have any connection with continental electricity grids. The Spanish state subsidises the extra cost of electrical energy generation in isolated systems. The purpose of this study is to quantify the proportion of the electricity bill that corresponds to tourist activity that is being subsidised. With this aim, three complementary methodologies have been developed. These tools could also be used in similar environments. The results reveal an average tourist sector consumption in the study years (2014–2017) between 12.8% and 16.5% of the total amount of electricity generated in the archipelago, with a monetary value of Spanish state subsidy estimated in €143.5 M in the year 2014. Additionally, a calculation was made of the values of CO2 emissions due to tourist electricity consumption for the years of the study period, with an estimated peak of 1.1 MtCO2 in 2017. From the point of view of energy policy, these results could be used to justify the adoption of various types of compensatory measures, including ecotaxes to be paid by the tourist visitor.

Keywords: Electricity; Archipelago; Tourism; Costs; Prices; Subsidies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421519304021
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:enepol:v:132:y:2019:i:c:p:839-853

DOI: 10.1016/j.enpol.2019.06.032

Access Statistics for this article

Energy Policy is currently edited by N. France

More articles in Energy Policy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().