A new approach to estimating tourism-induced electricity consumption

Tourism has started to be acknowledged as a significant contributor to the increase in environmental externalities, especially to climate change. Various studies have started to estimate and compute the role of different tourism sectors’ contributions to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. These estimations have been made from a sectoral perspective, assessing the contribution of air transport, the accommodation sector, or other tourism-related economic sectors. In this paper, the contribution of tourism to electricity consumption is investigated using the case study of the Balearic Islands (Spain). Using a conventional daily electricity demand model, including data for daily stocks of tourists, the impact of different tourist policy measures on electricity loads is also investigated. The results show that, in terms of electricity consumption, tourism cannot be considered a very energy-intensive sector.