Electricity consumption in Hong Kong: trend analysis and greenhouse gases emission

Abstract

The consumption of electricity has increased continuously in the past four decades. Inevitably, the emission of greenhouse gases has increased in the same period even though Hong Kong’s power companies have produced a certain percentage of electricity using “cleaner” fuels such as natural gas and nuclear power in recent years. This paper presents a four-parameter logistic model (To WM, Lai TM, Lo WC, Lam KH, Chung WL. The growth pattern and fuel life cycle analysis of the electricity consumption of Hong Kong. Environ Pollut. 2012;165:1–10) that describes the growth pattern of Hong Kong’s overall electricity consumption. The same approach was used to model the sectoral electricity consumption in Hong Kong. In addition, a fuel life cycle analysis was used to determine greenhouse gases emission due to electricity consumption. It was found that the emission factor due to the electricity generated in Hong Kong was 0.824 kg CO2-equivalent per kWh while the emission factor due to the electricity consumed in Hong Kong was 0.751 kg CO2-equivalent per kWh, as 23% of the electricity consumed was imported (net import) from the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Plant located in Shenzhen in 2012. Future electricity demand is presented.