Long-Run Demand for Energy Services: Income and Price Elasticities over Two Hundred Years

This article investigates how the demand for energy services has changed since the Industrial Revolution. It presents evidence on the income and price elasticities of demand for domestic heating, passenger transport, and lighting in the United Kingdom over the last two hundred years. As the economy developed and energy service prices fell, income elasticities have generally followed an inverse U-shape curve, and price elasticities have generally followed a U-shape curve. However, these general trends also appear to have been affected by energy and technological transitions, which boosted demand (by either encouraging poorer consumers to fully enter the market or offering new attributes of value to wealthier consumers). The evidence presented offers insights that will be helpful for identifying likely future trends in energy use and carbon dioxide emissions, and for developing long-term climate policies.