Does there exist energy congestion? Empirical evidence from Chinese industrial sectors

Data envelopment analysis as a nonparametric frontier approach has gained increasing popularity in assessing total factor energy efficiency performance. Earlier studies often assume that production activity lies in the economic area, and energy inefficiency associated with energy congestion has seldom been examined. This paper contributes to energy efficiency assessment by developing a decomposition model to examine the energy inefficiency driven by energy congestion and empirically examining whether the energy use in Chinese industrial sectors shows evidence of congestion. It is found that energy congestion does exist in Chinese industrial sectors but varies across different provinces. The provinces with high energy intensities are more likely to suffer from energy congestion. Our empirical results also show that energy congestion could be a main driving force of energy inefficiency. Some policy implications towards energy conservation in China are finally discussed.