Do Income and Population Influence the Convergence in Energy Intensity? : A Cross-Country Analysis

Countries’ energy intensity levels are known to converge at both the world and the regional levels. We test convergence in energy intensity for the world using a more recent and larger data set: a 152-country sample during the period of 1980-2010. Furthermore, we use income, population and combination of income and population as subgroups to test convergence of energy intensity. We find the convergence of energy intensity for the world. We also find that energy intensity convergence takes place with substantially different patterns for different subgroups. Thus, effective energy policies may need to be customized for each subgroup of nations