Convergência do consumo de energia elétrica residencial per capita entre os estados do Brasil

Abstract

This article tests the hypothesis of convergence of residential electricity consumption per capita in Brazilian States considering the period from 1970 to 2008. To this end, we employed the convergence tests of Evans and Karras (1996) and Beyaert and Camacho (2008). The results suggest that both the dispersion of per capita electricity consumption has decreased over time, as the states with lower levels of consumption in 1970 have higher growth rates. Regarding econometric results, it was found that the convergence is not described by a linear model with full convergence, since both in regime I and regime II, and in both regimes, there is evidence of convergence of per capita consumption. Furthermore, it was found that there is absolute convergence between states, that is, they converge to the same steady-state position.