Covid 19 and loss of production – an estimate for Portugal from electricity consumption

Miguel Aubyn ()

No 01/2020, CFP Working Papers from Portuguese Public Finance Council

Abstract: The relationship between electricity consumption and economic activity has been widely studied. It comes then as no surprise that the need to obtain a fast estimate for the GDP drop following the perceived devastating economic effects resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic would lead forecasting practitioners into exploiting this relationship. This drive is further explained, at least in the case of Portugal, by the fact that electricity consumption daily data are published almost in real-time as compared to delays in other potentially informative variables. As usual, there is a trade-off between speed and estimate accuracy. Any result of this kind is not a suitable replacement for better and more complete information, and, in due time, complete and accurate measurements will be available. In the meantime, less precise but already available instruments provide us with some guidance and insight.

Keywords: forecast; economic activity; electricity consumption; Portugal (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C32 E17 E23 Q43 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 8 pages
Date: 2020-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene and nep-mac
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:alf:wpaper:2020-01

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